Energy-efficient buildings start-up FenestraPro raises €1.2m in seed funding

11 Apr 2019

Design of Kuwait International Airport facade, using FenestraPro software. Image: FenestraPro

Irish company’s software helps leading architects design the energy-efficient buildings of the future.

Dublin software company FenestraPro has raised €1.2m in seed funding from investors that include Pi Labs, Enterprise Ireland and Applied Software.

The start-up provides software applications for the design of more energy-efficient building facades.

‘The value of FenestraPro is being realised and accepted by some of the leading firms in the world’
– DAVID PALMER

FenestraPro’s software is fully integrable with Autodesk’s building information modelling software and enables architects to design environmentally efficient building facades more cost-effectively.

Since launching the platform in 2017, six of the top 10 global architectural firms – such as Aecom, Gensler, and Skidmore, Owings & Merrill – have used FenestraPro on large-scale projects such as Aecom’s design for Kuwait’s new international airport terminal.

Beyond the facade

“The ability to feed up-to-date facade material and product information into the workflow in a very intelligent way will now see components selected based on their energy performance characteristics,” explained Simon Whelan, co-founder of FenestraPro.

“This will ensure that architects and other building design professionals have the tools and understanding to design better-performing building facades to meet their design intent, and ultimately to design better buildings.”

The Irish company is currently working with some of the leading facade component manufacturers and released FenestraPro Linc (beta), which will provide access to live facade component manufacturer data. Focused on glazing and curtain wall systems in the near term, Linc will enable users to select the most appropriate components based on their environmental performance credentials.

“FenestraPro has been transformational for us, empowering our architects to quickly design and deliver beautiful, functional buildings that also achieve the energy performance requirements that have become part of our ethos at Page,” explained Robert Phinney, director of sustainable design at Page.

“These kinds of benefits ultimately make a difference to us in impacting the way that people work and live.”

The company said it plans to raise extra funds in the coming months to accelerate its move into the US, UK and Scandinavian markets.

“The value of FenestraPro is being realised and accepted by some of the leading firms in the world as we see FenestraPro adopted into their mainstream design workflows to guide them in designing better-performing buildings,” added co-founder David Palmer.

John Kennedy is a journalist who served as editor of Silicon Republic for 17 years

editorial@siliconrepublic.com