Point of View – by Mia Javier

[cross posted on blog.cleantech.com]

If you drive a car, you are likely unaware of the processes various parts have endured. Door lock mechanisms and tie-down hooks on truck beds – to name a few examples – are covered with anti-corrosive coating to ensure product lifetime.

The manufacturing process associated with coating technologies, however, is so toxic that China and the European Union have implemented new regulations that prohibit traditional technologies including plating, zinc flake and hot dip galvanized. Such processes produce toxic fumes and hazardous waste by-product.

Cleveland-based, UK incorporated company, Greenkote, has developed a surface metal coating technology that not only replaces but outperforms toxic conventional coating technologies. The company has developed a proprietary process by which the coating product is diffused onto the metal, creating a dry process that eliminates toxic fumes and hazardous waste.

“Not only is the material environmentally friendly, the process is environmentally friendly,” Jim Thomson, the company’s chief financial officer told the Cleantech Group.

The process helps save on costs as well, Thomson told us, since the elimination of hazardous waste mitigates the need for cleanup management costs.

According to Thompson, Greenkote aims to license their technology to the component manufacturers or ‘Tier 1s’ that directly produce parts of original equipment manufacturers like VW Audi, Ford or Daimler.

“OEMs have a production part approval process where Tier 1 component manufacturers must work with companies like us on new coating specifications for the OEMs,” said Thomson.

It is in these coating specifications that OEMs aim to comply with regulation, according to Thomson.

According to Thomson, the largest user of their technology is VW Audi. Daimler has also accepted their technology and is in the process of putting in a parts order for Greenkote, Thomson told us.

While the company is breaking into the automobile industry, the company has its roots in construction parts, Thomson told us.

“In construction, there are a lot of fasteners in bridges and other construction structures,” Thomson said.

“We have done various bridges in the UK, projects in the Heathrow airport as well as a cricket stadium,” Thomson said.

Today, the company is raising £16 million to break into the North American, European and Asian automobile industries. The funding will be used to fund small pilot lines until the technology can be licensed to the Tier 1s, according to Thomson.

2009 company revenue was $7 million, according to Thomson and he expects that number to grow to $30 million in four years.