In Sweden, technology developer Mantex AB has recently announced that it has signed a Letter of Intenet (LoI) with Austria-headed international technology group Andritz AG regarding the joint development of Mantex Biofuel Analyzer for the bioenergy industry.
According to a statement, in a first step, the agreement means that Andritz will finance the development work of the Biofuel Analyzer for up to five months, which is the time that Mantex believes it will take to develop the finished product.
If the development work is successful, the parties also agree to investigate a possible collaboration on the biofuel analyzer market side in the next step. Mantex and Andritz will now negotiate a more detailed agreement regarding commercialization, marketing, and sales, with the ambition to get such a deal during the fourth quarter of this year.
Final development stages
The Mantex Biofuel Analyzer is basically based on the same X-ray technology as the Mantex Flow Scanner developed for the paper and pulp industry. The Biofuel Analyzer has been developed to be able to quickly and accurately measure central properties of biomass such as energy content, moisture and ash content.
The climate crisis has led to a sharp increase in interest in renewable bioenergy and thus also to more accurate measurement methods as it is a prerequisite for efficient biomass trading and use.
However, the measuring instrument needs to be further developed to achieve the measurement accuracy required for a certification, which in turn is a prerequisite for broad commercialization.
We still have some time left before we reach, but thanks to this agreement, we have access to both the resources and the expertise we need to complete the measurement technology in our Biofuel Analyzer and get it on the market,” commented Max Gerger, CEO of Mantex.
Build on ATAB joint venture
Since 2018, the Flow Scanner has been developed and sold by the joint venture company Andritz Technologies AB, ATAB, where Andritz owns 51 percent and Mantex the remaining 49. The logic of putting the Flow Scanner in a company jointly with Andritz was to benefit from the company’s large market organization, contact network and global resources.
By putting the Flow Scanner into a jointly owned company, we have been able to get it on the market much faster than we could have managed on our own. In the past year alone, four agreements have been signed regarding the delivery of the Flow Scanner, which has resulted in a multiplication of orders for the product compared to the sales rate Mantex had historically on its own, said Max Gerger.
A similar arrangement between Andritz and Mantex also with regard to the Biofuel Analyzer is an opportunity that will be evaluated in connection with the upcoming development work.
If we together manage to develop our Biofuel Analyzer to a finished product, we and Andritz have the ambition to integrate that product into ATAB as well. For Mantex, the benefits of joining forces with Andritz are very large, not least in terms of market resources and customer relationships, ended Max Gerger.
