A French nature tech startup has secured undisclosed funding from the European Space Agency (ESA) to develop a biodiversity monitoring tool for potential use in nature-related disclosures and the biodiversity credit market, Carbon Pulse has learned.

Kanop, a data analytics company specialising in nature-based solutions, was awarded the contract following a tender launched by ESA, with plans to finalise the tool by the end of the year, according to Romain Fau, the company’s CEO and co-founder.

“ESA is the main funder of the initiative, but other investors have supported it,” Fau told Carbon Pulse, preferring not to disclose their names and the amount raised.

“We want to go big on that because we think that’s where the future is. Investing in carbon without biodiversity doesn’t make any sense.”

Since its launch in 2021, Kanop has been supporting organisations in assessing the environmental benefits of nature-based projects and complying with voluntary carbon market (VCM) standards through stock and change measurement of key indicators such as forest cover, canopy height, biomass, and carbon stock across various ecosystems.

Kanop’s biodiversity monitoring tool will combine a number of indexes to assess ecosystem integrity, habitat connectivity, and species abundance, evenness, and richness.

It will leverage satellite imagery and light detection and ranging (Lidar) technologies, though the company mulls including bioacoustics and environmental DNA (eDNA) as well starting next year.

“Some startups use global data sets and then aggregate them. But on our end, we start from sites, as we want to be the most accurate provider of biodiversity information. That’s what we are building,” said Fau.

THREE USE CASES

He said the company intends to provide data that fit into three main use cases – supporting corporate reporting under the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) and EU’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) frameworks, informing investors’ decisions on biodiversity, and facilitating conservation and restoration activities.

“Biodiversity credits could be a part of this use case, as companies and project developers need biodiversity data to understand their starting point before taking action on nature conservation and restoration,” he said.

“As well, high-quality data is critical to bolster nature-related disclosures. With the new CSRD reporting requirements coming into force next year, we need to be ready for companies with extensive land use. Those are the organisations we’re targeting.”

Following the initial contributions by ESA and other investors, Kanop now plans to launch a seed funding round by the end of October to scale its technology.

“We look to involve impact investors as well as venture capital companies. We want investors that understand what we are doing,” said Fau.

“The return on investment is not as immediate as if they’re investing in a fintech startup, so we want to make sure we onboard people that really understand and have the patience to get robust results.”

Fau said Kanop expects to raise a “similar amount” to UK-based nature platform provider Natcap, which closed a $2.5-million ($3.2 mln) seed round last year prior to this week’s $10-mln Series A funding round, though he admitted that biodiversity monitoring still struggles to draw significant investment.

Unlike carbon, biodiversity monitoring alone is not financially sustainable for most nature tech firms due to a lack of funding and corporate demand, as recently argued by the Switzerland-based Inverto Earth and UK-headquartered Treeconomy startups.

Although financing for nature tech companies has increased significantly in recent months, especially in the monitoring field, there are insufficient funds for all the initiatives seeking to move into the biodiversity market, experts told Carbon Pulse last month.

By Sergio Colombo – sergio@carbon-pulse.com

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