Kenoteq, the Scottish company behind a brick made almost entirely from construction waste, has taken in just under £900,000 as the first tranche of a £2m fundraise, and will spend it on production capacity.
Kelvin Capital led. The Scottish Enterprise Co-Investment Fund also took part, as did several existing shareholders who increased their stakes. The round is still open and the company says it is in discussions with other prospective investors. The money is intended to raise output of the K-Briq and speed up delivery against a pipeline of healthcare, hospitality and commercial work.
That pipeline is the substantive part of the announcement. The K-Briq has been selected for an NHS development in Wales, described by the company as among the NHS’s most sustainable hospital projects, and is being supplied to theatre and restaurant projects in London. Daily Business also lists, among current jobs, Heriot-Watt’s Dubai campus and a bakery in Surrey.
“We have built strong momentum over the past year and are now seeing that translate into an increasingly exciting pipeline of commercial projects across multiple sectors,” said chief executive Andrew Holt. “Securing work on major healthcare, hospitality and commercial developments demonstrates the confidence that clients are placing in our products and our team.”
He added that the round “remains open and we continue to welcome conversations with investors who share our ambition for the future of the business”.
The K-Briq is made from almost 100% recycled construction and demolition waste and is cured rather than fired, which is where its carbon claim comes from: the company says its embodied carbon is under 5% of a traditional clay brick’s.
Kenoteq describes itself as a 2019 spin-out from Heriot-Watt University, and Heriot-Watt describes it the same way. It was co-founded by Professor Gabriela Medero and Dr Sam Chapman, and traces its origins to discussions between researchers at the university and the Edinburgh waste firm Hamilton Waste & Recycling. It manufactures at a plant in East Lothian, which opened for commercial production after the brick was certified by the British Board of Agrément in May 2025, and can make two million bricks a year with scope to double that.
John McNicol, a director at Kelvin Capital, said the company was “exactly the kind of business Kelvin Capital likes to back: proven technology, a clear commercial strategy, and a team turning innovation into real-world impact”. Kelvin Capital is an angel syndicate with more than 300 investors and, according to Daily Business, a portfolio of 22 companies collectively valued at more than £250m.
