Altiflex: EIC Accelerator Money for Reusable Site Enclosures

Every building under construction has holes in it for months: window openings, door gaps, open floor edges. In Denmark and much of Europe these are usually closed with wooden battens and plastic sheeting that tears in the wind, lets heat escape and ends up as waste. Altiflex, a Hvidovre company founded in 2004, rents and sells an alternative: adjustable aluminium frames with impact-resistant translucent panels that click together into temporary walls and can be used again on the next site.

In the 9 January 2019 cut-off of the EIC SME Instrument Phase 2, the Horizon 2020 round that preceded the EIC Accelerator pilot, Altiflex won a grant for FLEXBUILD, a project to take the system "from prototype level to industrial and commercial readiness". The EU contribution was €1,761,613 towards a total cost of €2,516,590, according to CORDIS, and the company appears as the only beneficiary of the project on the European Commission's list of selected SME Instrument Phase 2 companies. Seven years later the product is on the market and the company is profitable. The growth the application forecast is not visible in its accounts.

Where Altiflex Stands Now

Altiflex ApS is an active company registered in Hvidovre, according to North Data. Its latest annual report, for the year to 30 June 2025, was approved on 11 December 2025 and shows a net profit of DKK 7,110,787 and equity of DKK 38,391,920, according to the filings published by the Danish Business Authority. The report names Bjørn Stougaard Baunbæk as managing director and Kim Lang Sørensen as chair; North Data dates both appointments to 2025. Founder Lasse Ramskov remains a director and board member. The company has belonged to Altiflex Holding ApS since 2017, when it took over from Lasse Ramskov Holding ApS, according to North Data.

The company is still selling. Its website offers facade closures, safety railings approved under the EN 13374 standard, temporary doors, dust and noise walls, storage rooms and construction tents for rent or purchase, and says Altiflex is also present in Sweden and Norway. In March 2026 the trade magazine Byggeri+Arkitektur described the system in use on the renovation of Hotel Nyborg Strand. The company lists Danish contractors such as NCC, Züblin, CG Jensen and Pihl & Søn among its references; these projects are the company's own account and could not be checked against the contractors.

The Technology: Modules Instead of Plastic Sheeting

The standard way to close a building shell before windows and facades arrive is a timber frame covered in polyethylene film. The FLEXBUILD reports on CORDIS describe the drawbacks: film rips, frames rot and collect mould, heat escapes, and the material is burnt after one use. Altiflex's modules are aluminium frames with breakproof translucent panels that can be adjusted in width and height, joined to close an opening of any size, removed for a day and remounted. Because the closure also meets the safety railing standard, one installation replaces two, the company says on its About page.

The selling point is heat. A building in winter construction must be heated to dry out and to give workers acceptable conditions, often with diesel heaters. Better insulation of the temporary shell means less fuel. The size of that saving is where the company's own figures diverge:

1. 2016 and 2019 project descriptionsEstimate"Up to 60%" energy saving in winter against plastic seals, based on "initial calculations" (CORDIS).
2. Final EU project report, 202149%Viegand Maagøe life cycle analysis of November 2020: 49% less CO2 and 8 tonnes saved for a 300 m² enclosure over four months (CORDIS).
3. Annual report 2021/22About 50%CO2 and heating costs cut "up to approx. 50%" (filed accounts).
4. Company website, 202663%Citing the same Viegand Maagøe analysis for the same 300 m² over four months: 63% less CO2 and 8.6 tonnes saved (altiflex.dk).

The analysis itself has not been published; the EU report says it is "available on request". The gap between 49% in the report filed with the EU and 63% on today's website, both attributed to the same consultancy and the same 300 m² scenario, could not be explained from public sources. Whether the analysis was updated is not stated.

What FLEXBUILD Promised, and What CORDIS Shows

FLEXBUILD was Altiflex's second grant for the same product. In 2016 it received €50,000 from the SME Instrument Phase 1 for a six-month feasibility study, which forecast "over €17 million revenues, 3-years post-project", according to CORDIS. The 2019 Phase 2 application raised the forecast to "over €58million revenues, 5-years post-project". The grant agreement was signed on 30 April 2019 and the project ran from 1 May 2019 to 31 December 2021.

The three periodic reports describe a project that did the technical work on time but needed more time for the market tests. The first report, for months 1 to 10, calls FLEXBUILD a 20-month project and says the product had been refined, tested at a construction site, and put into full-scale production with suppliers. The second, for months 10 to 21, calls it a 32-month project: "Demos are moving slowly (compared to original plan in 2019) but follows the plan agreed in latest amendment." The final report lists demonstration sites in Norway and Sweden, adds the life cycle analysis and states that "all targets have been achieved". The deliverables behind that claim are not public on CORDIS.

1. Industrial production of the modulesDeliveredReported in the first two periodic reports; the product line is sold and rented today (CORDIS, altiflex.dk).
2. Demonstrations on live sitesLateNorwegian and Swedish demos reported, after the project was extended from 20 to 32 months.
3. Documented environmental benefitPartlyA third-party life cycle analysis exists but is unpublished, and the company quotes two different results from it.
4. Over €58M revenue within five yearsNot evidencedRevenue is not published; gross profit was DKK 16.95M in 2024/25 and staff fell (accounts).
5. International market entryUnverifiedThe website claims presence in Sweden and Norway; no foreign subsidiary, customer or sales figure was found.

The Money: A Profitable Holding Structure, Not a Start-Up

Altiflex was no early-stage company when the EU funded it. It had been trading for 15 years, and in the year before the award it made a net profit of DKK 20,357,132, which its 2017/18 accounts attribute to the sale of its entire rental fleet during that year. The accounts do not name the buyer. By 30 June 2025 the balance sheet again carried rental equipment worth DKK 41.3 million, of which DKK 18.4 million was leased, along with DKK 41.7 million owed by group companies and DKK 32.4 million owed to them. The parent, Altiflex Holding ApS, holds Altiflex Udlejning ApS ("Altiflex Rental") and Gl. Lager ApS as well, according to North Data, so the company's own accounts show only part of the group's business.

During the project the company made small profits, then a loss of DKK 434,613 in 2020/21, which the accounts put down to more marketing and product development. That year the auditors' going concern note says the company relied on a support and subordination letter from the group's ultimate owner, capped at DKK 6 million for the group. The jump to DKK 12.34 million in 2021/22 came partly from accounting changes: the company began adding DKK 7.7 million of indirect production costs to its inventory value, and stretched depreciation to 20 years with a 40% scrap value, which by its own estimate added about DKK 1.5 million before tax. For 2022/23 it proposed a DKK 21 million dividend while holding DKK 46 in cash at the year end; equity fell from DKK 50.1 million to DKK 31.3 million the following year.

Staff numbers did not follow the forecast. The average full-time headcount was 15 in 2019/20, the first project year, fell to 9 in 2022/23 and 2023/24, and recovered to 11 in 2024/25. The accounts disagree on the year before the award: the 2018/19 report gives 12 employees, and the 2019/20 report restates the same year as 10.

Why Europe Should Care

The EU's building rules start from the fact that "around 40% of energy consumed in the EU is used in buildings", according to the Commission's page on the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive, and construction and demolition waste "accounts for more than a third of all waste generated in the EU", according to its page on construction waste. Those rules target finished buildings. The energy burnt and the plastic thrown away during construction is a smaller, less regulated slice, and reusable site equipment of the kind Altiflex rents fits the circular economy aims of the EU even if no directive requires it.

The Verdict

Altiflex and the EIC have not been asked for comment for this article. It is based on public records and published statements, linked throughout.