Attaching anything to an existing steel structure usually means welding or drilling. On a ship, an offshore platform or in a nuclear plant, both are slow, need permits and can weaken the structure or start a fire. Cold Pad, a Paris company founded in 2011, sells the alternative: a mechanical anchor point, the C-Claw, that is bonded to the steel with structural adhesive and installed in minutes with a portable tool, the C-Hawk.
The European Innovation Council paid €2,498,014.75 towards a €3.57 million project to industrialise both. The project hit its engineering goals, the fastener won type approval from Bureau Veritas, the EIC Fund invested, and in 2024 the company reported a profit after three years in the red.
Company file
- Legal entity
- Cold Pad SAS, SIREN 532 790 623
- Founded
- May 2011, Paris
- Leadership
- Jean-Philippe Court (founder, president); Julien Bec (managing director since June 2024)
- Products
- C-Claw bonded fasteners; C-Hawk installation tool
- Named customers
- EDF, TotalEnergies
- Investors
- NCI, LBO France (NewStone), EIC Fund, Cléry
- EIC project
- C_CLAW_C_HAWK, 1 Mar 2022 to 31 Oct 2024, closed
- Staff
- 10 to 19 (register band)
What Cold Pad Sells Today
Cold Pad's flagship is the C-Claw S300, a bonded fastener for steel rated for loads of up to 300 kilograms that one technician can install in under two minutes. In November 2024 Bureau Veritas Marine & Offshore issued a type approval certificate for it, the first for this technology. The markets are marine and offshore, nuclear, wind and oil and gas, and the company is expanding into construction.
In June 2024 Cold Pad raised more than €7 million, co-led by NCI and LBO France's NewStone fund with the EIC Fund and Cléry, alongside non-dilutive support from Bpifrance's France Relance Nucléaire programme. The announcement named EDF and TotalEnergies among its customers.
"Our portable tool can safely and quickly secure anchor points, eliminating the need for drilling and welding."
Jean-Philippe Court, founder and president, Cold Pad, June 2024The Technology: Structural Bonding in the Field
Bonding metal is routine in factories, where surfaces can be cleaned and conditions controlled. Doing it reliably on a rusty platform or a damp ship's hull is the hard part. Cold Pad's C-Hawk tool creates what the company describes as laboratory conditions around the joint, controlling humidity and pressure while the adhesive cures, so that the bond is repeatable wherever it is made. The fastener's claw holds the load once bonded; no hole is drilled and no heat applied.
The EIC project's report lists testing of "more than 15 types of material with more than 30 adhesive references", a fastener redesign that cut steel use by 85%, and an ATEX-compliant pneumatic tool, suitable for explosive atmospheres, with three times fewer components and one sixth of the manufacturing cost.
What the EIC Project Promised, and What CORDIS Shows
The project ran from 1 March 2022 to 31 October 2024 under the 2021 Open call. Its objective framed civil engineering's contribution to CO2 emissions, put at about 15%, and promised non-intrusive bonding and fastening for harsh industrial settings, civil engineering and hydrogen infrastructure, making life extension of old structures "environmentally sound and economically feasible".
- An industrial fastener and toolDeliveredRedesigned fastener and ATEX tool; the C-Claw S300 is on sale.
- CertificationDeliveredBureau Veritas type approval in November 2024; groundwork for EU harmonised rules and CE marking of bonded fasteners.
- Hydrogen infrastructurePartialBonding for explosive environments emphasised; no hydrogen deployment published.
- Civil engineering and constructionStartedNamed as the expansion market for the 2024 round.
A mix-up in the EIC's own list
Cold Pad's CORDIS objective describes "composite bonding and fastening solutions". The EIC's published list of June 2021 winners gives almost that exact description, "reliable and durable composite bonding & fastening solutions", to the line above Cold Pad: Aenitis Technologies, a company that sorts cells with sound waves. The error sits in the EU's record, not in either company.
What Cold Pad Has Achieved Since the Award
The Money
Cold Pad keeps its revenue confidential, but its results are public on Pappers and Societe.com. It lost €953,000 in 2021, €446,000 in 2022 and €651,400 in 2023, and in 2022 its shareholders formally decided to continue operating even though net assets had fallen below half the share capital, a situation French company law requires them to address. In 2024 it reported a net profit of €2,397,900. Equity went from minus €2.0 million to plus €4.23 million, debt fell from €2.95 million to €2.25 million and cash rose from €0.41 million to €1.36 million.
One good year
A single profitable year is encouraging, but with revenue undisclosed it is impossible to say how much of the 2024 profit came from sales and how much from grants, subsidies or one-off items. The 2025 accounts will show whether it repeats.
Why Europe Should Care
Extending the life of existing structures, rather than replacing them, is the use the project itself named, and its customers run offshore, nuclear and wind assets. A method that adds attachments without welding avoids hot work in sensitive sites. Cold Pad's backing reflects that: French nuclear recovery funding, an EU grant and EU equity, and customers among France's largest energy groups.
What the project promised
Non-intrusive bonded fastening for harsh industry, civil engineering and hydrogen, making life extension of structures viable.
What the record shows
A certified, redesigned product with named energy customers, a €7M round with the EIC Fund and a 2024 profit, with hydrogen and construction still ahead.
The Verdict
One of the clearer successes
Cold Pad used its EIC grant for exactly what grants are for: turning a working idea into a cheaper, faster, certified industrial product. The market responded with investment and, in 2024, a profit. The open questions are scale and repeatability, but on the evidence available this is one of the EIC's better-spent grants from its first Horizon Europe round.
Cold Pad has not been asked for comment for this article. It is based entirely on public records, company statements and EU project data, linked throughout.
