15-04-2025
30 Under 30 Europe Manufacturing & Industry 2025: Europe's Top Industrial Entrepreneurs Focus On AI And The Environment
E
urope and the U.S. have more than 1 million factories that run on fossil fuel. They produce steel, chemicals, cars—and a whole lot of carbon. In fact, 20% of global CO2 emissions belch from European industry, says a 2024 McKinsey report. The European Union wants factories to ditch oil and gas by 2050. Good luck. 'That means converting a hundred sites a day—Monday through Sunday—for the next 25 years,' says Olli Kangas, 28, the founder of green software start-up Intergrid. The math is daunting, but Kangas is building the tools to help companies comply.
He launched Intergrid, a Helsinki-based technology company, with Pasi Hakulinen, 29, to help industrial companies replace fuels with clean electricity. The tech offers custom simulations to show companies the best ways to power their plants, source the right equipment, and AI-powered analysis to minimize costs.
Sebastian Nevols for Forbes
'What the customers need is an easy way out of fossil fuels,' Kangas says. 'So we need to bring it to the level that it's a no-brainer for companies to switch.'
Since its launch in 2023, Intergrid has raised $13 million, scaled to a team of over 20, and now serves 40 factories across Finland and the Netherlands.
Intergrid is just one of the promising startups spotlighted in the 2025 Under 30 Europe Manufacturing & Industry list. Candidates were evaluated by a panel of expert judges featuring Axel Lorenz, CEO of process automation at Siemens; Marina Bill, president of the International Federation of Robotics; Romy Schnelle, managing director of pre-seed and seed investment company High-Tech Gründerfonds (HTGF); and Abhilash Borana, a 2022 Under 30 alum and founder and chairman of Fáilte Solar.
This year's honorees include founders across robotics, drones, offshore wind turbine operators and beyond. All candidates must have been 29 or younger as of April 9th, 2025, and never before named to a Europe, North America or Asia 30 Under 30 list.
Some 2025 listers are making leaps in robotics. Take Oslo-based Vilje Bionics, which has raised $4 million to develop VilPower, a full-arm exoskeleton. This multinational team consists of Saeid Hosseini, 29, from Iran; Julia Christina Kenel, 28, from Switzerland; and Eirik Bodsberg, 29, and Asmund Kvam Kollbye, 29, from Norway. They've created technology that could potentially help the some 60 million people with arm and hand paralysis across the world. They design AI-powered prosthetics they hope will one day restore natural movement to this part of the body.
Then there's Angsa Robotics, which is developing AI-powered robots for autonomous trash removal on grass and gravel surfaces. The Munich-based company, cofounded and led by Lukas Wiesmeier, 29, has its technology deployed in over 20 German cities and has removed more than 30,000 trash items, including 15,000 cigarette butts—preventing up to 15 million liters of water pollution. It has raised nearly $2.6 million along the way.
Meanwhile, Zurich-based Ascento provides autonomous outdoor robot patrols for industrial sites. Cofounded by Alessandro Morra, 28; Dominik Mannhart, 28; and Ciro Salzmann, 29, Ascento's wheel-leg design robots can navigate complex environments like rough terrain and stairs, addressing the high turnover rate in human security personnel. The ETH Zurich graduates raised $4.3 million in pre-seed funding. In their first full year of business, they generated over $1 million in revenue through their robotics-as-a-service subscription.
Over in the Netherlands, Akhilesh Goveas, 29, cofounded SpectX, whose X-ray technology uses synchronized drones to inspect offshore wind turbines, bridges, power lines, and oil and gas pipelines, and provides real-time data. Securing nearly $6.4 million in funding from the Dutch government and generating $3.6 million in revenue by 2024, SpectX won a nearly $11 million tender in January 2025 for building autonomous drone swarms for offshore wave prediction.
When it comes to the fashion industry and improving some of its unsustainable practices, Marco Bertone, 27, cofounded Syntetica in November 2023 to transform synthetic textile waste into 100% recycled nylon. The Paris-based startup has raised $4.5 million in funding and secured $500,000 in brand contracts with Victoria's Secret, ETAM and DIM, among others.
In the world realized by this year's 30 Under 30 honorees, electrified heating replaces fossil fuel burners, stroke survivors regain movement, and drones secure infrastructure instead of sparking surveillance fears. Together, these founders sketch a future where automation, sustainability and human-centered design are the standard. What unites them is a belief that change at scale is possible, and already underway.
This year's list was edited by Igor Bosilkovski, Hannah Hall and LaVonne Roberts. For a link to our complete 2025 30 Under 30 Europe Manufacturing & Industry list, click here, and for full 2025 30 Under 30 Europe coverage, click here.
