BackingMinds & Shift4Good co-lead seed round in Cetasol - AI-driven decision support for the maritime industry

Gothenburg, Sweden, 24 September, 2025

Cetasol, a Swedish startup developing AI-driven decision support solutions for increased insights and reduced costs and GHG emissions, has secured a seed funding round of €2.3M. The round brings in new investors BackingMinds and Shift4Good, alongside continued support from existing investor Sarsia.

• €2.3M seed round co-led by BackingMinds, Shift4Good, with participation from previous investor Sarsia
• Cetasol’s flagship solution, iHelm, enables 10–25% fuel savings for small to mid-size vessels
• Focused on scaling sustainable maritime operations globally
• Accelerates the introduction of AI-driven decision support and digital twin technology to the maritime industry

The Swedish AI company Cetasol has successfully closed its latest seed investment round. With this investment round, Cetasol can continue to introduce AI-driven decision support and digital twin technology to the maritime industry for increased fuel optimizations, insights and predictive maintenance.

"This investment confirms that our approach to AI-driven decision support and maritime sustainability is both needed and trusted. With this support, we are scaling faster and wider — delivering intelligent solutions to maritime operations globally." Ethan Faghani, CEO and Founder of Cetasol.

Shipping is responsible for about 3% of global CO₂ emissions. While innovation and investment have largely focused on electrification and large vessels, small and mid-sized vessels, which make up nearly 90% of the global fleet, offer the fastest and most scalable path to significant climate impact.

This is where fuel optimization, driven by real vessel data, comes in. By leveraging both real-time and historical data, operators can make informed decisions to optimize performance and reduce costs and GHG emissions. That is why Cetasol developed iHelm — to reduce emissions from today’s vessels using real operational data.

iHelm – intelligent decision support

Cetasol’s core solution is iHelm — a decision support solution for individual vessels and the entire fleet. iHelm helps save fuel, track vessel performance, stay compliant, and maximise uptime – with real-time decision support and data-driven insights.

The system continuously gathers data directly from the vessel and through Cetasol’s digital twin technology of vessel and engine, enabling real-time recommendations to the captain via edge computing. All operational data is also transmitted to a cloud-based dashboard, giving fleet managers and business owners access to both real-time and historical performance metrics, AI-driven decision support and predictive maintenance capabilities.

Investors enabling growth of AI-driven decision support for the maritime industry

Niclas Wijkström, CFO & Investment Director at BackingMinds

"Cetasol is tackling one of the maritime industry’s biggest blind spots. While most solutions target the largest vessels, nearly 90% of the global fleet consists of small- and medium-sized ships that are underserved and often lack access to affordable optimization tools. By combining edge computing with AI-driven analytics, it addresses critical challenges such as fuel optimization, real-time decision support, and emissions tracking. We are proud to back Cetasol’s talented team, led by Ethan, and to support their journey as they scale globally."

Matthieu de Chanville, Managing Partner at Shift4Good

“Cetasol has developed a solution that delivers measurable impact and ROI from day one — it’s already proven, easy to deploy across a wide range of vessels, and highly relevant for fleet managers. What’s more, the platform lays the groundwork for the future of optimized maritime operations through predictive maintenance — a domain we already know well from our investments in road mobility. We see strong complementarity, both in terms of expertise and market presence, especially in Southeast Asia where we’re very active. We’ve also been impressed by Ethan’s deep domain knowledge, bold vision, and relentless drive.”

Jon-Kåre Hansen, Partner at Sarsia

”Cetasol has continued to strengthen its AI-driven fuel saving solution over the last year, and is now the clear No.1 provider in the mid-size vessel market. There is a lot of opportunities and a lot of fuel to save. Over the last year the customer base has been growing fast, and Sarsia strongly believes in the team and are happy to continue to support the journey.“

Future outlook and goals

With this new investment, Cetasol will focus on scaling the business and strengthening its commercial operations. The company aims to expand its presence in key maritime markets, deepen customer relationships, and further develop its partner network. A central goal is to accelerate the adoption of iHelm across a broader range of vessel types and geographies, ensuring measurable impact on energy efficiency and GHG emissions reduction. Cetasol will also continue to invest in product development, enhancing its intelligent platform to meet the evolving needs of the maritime industry and support more data-driven and sustainable operations globally.

About Cetasol

Cetasol develops intelligent, AI-driven solutions that transform vessel operations. Our flagship product, iHelm, is a proven decision support platform that helps fleets save fuel, track performance, stay compliant, and maximize uptime. By combining deep maritime expertise with advanced data science, we deliver actionable insights that reduce costs and GHG emissions—making sustainable operations a simple choice.

For further information please visit www.cetasol.com

About Sarsia

Sarsia is an early-stage venture capital fund that invests in a greener and healthier future. Based out of the Nordics, they look for technologies and founders capable of accelerating the green transition and building sustainable companies for the future.

For more information, please visit www.sarsia.com

About BackingMinds

BackingMinds is a Swedish venture capital investor, that finds and backs high-performing founders outside the networks of traditional venture capital. For BackingMinds, backing is about more than money. Backing is a mindset, a desire to roll up your sleeves and scale companies. They invest in industry-agnostic in early-stage tech companies.

For more information, please visit www.backingminds.com

About Shift4Good

Shift4Good is an impact venture capital fund with €220 million in assets under management, focused on the decarbonization of the transportation sector. It invests in the transport for goods and people, which alone accounts for around 25% of global CO2 emissions. Backed by top-notch institutional financial investors and major mobility players, Shift4Good has built a unique model to identify and support the best entrepreneurs—those capable of developing and deploying the radical innovations required by the climate emergency. Shift4Good has offices in Paris and Singapore.

For more information, please visit www.shift4good.com