Budapest-based Resysten Science and Research (Resysten) announced the launch of a new product in the UK capable of absorbing substantial amounts of air polluting gases when applied to the exterior surfaces of buildings, the company announced on June 15. The product’s launch was timed on Clean Air Day.

Clean Air can absorb up to 222mg a day of nitrogen oxides from one sqm of exterior coated surface and the coating can also be applied not just to exterior walls, but also banners, LCD screens, vehicles, restaurant drive-throughs or supermarket car parks, consuming the nitrogen oxides, the company said in a statement sent to bne IntelliNews.

The rollout of the company’s new product was preceded by thorough testing at Queen’s University in Belfast.

"This is a game changer in the fight against air pollution, which costs up to 4,000 lives a year in London alone", said Shajjad Rizvi, global CEO, who was appointed in 2020 to lead the company’s global market expansion.

To launch its new coating technology, Resysten has created a joint venture in the UK with partners Clean Air Global Ltd., who have already won numerous projects in the country and are now lining up multiple requests coming in from across the world. 

Resysten was founded by four individuals in 2014 with a focus on helping healthcare systems deal with hospital-acquired infections, bacteria outbreaks in food processing plants and preventing flu outbreaks via public transport networks.

Following the outbreak of the pandemic, the company prioritised extensive testing in 2020 to discover that its revolutionary photocatalytic coating system proved fully effective against COVID-19. The family-owned business' proprietary hygiene coating prevents pathogens from adhering to any surface for up to a full year.

In April, the company inaugurated an R&D lab at an incubator run by the University of Szeged, which was the first investment in the science park the university set up near the ELI Attosecond Light Pulse Source (ELI-ALPS) laser research facility.

Late last year, Columbus Private Equity Fund, established by Magyar Eximbank and Carion Holding to support the international expansion of Hungarian SMEs, invested HUF750mn (€2mn) in the company.

Resysten, present in over 20 countries, has already treated 130,000 sqm of space and more than 900 vehicles.

The company booked HUF30mn in profit on HUF336mn revenue in 2021.