Stem, the US-based energy storage technology provider backed by corporates General Electric (GE), Total, Iberdrola, Mitsui, Exelon and RWE, added $26m on Tuesday to a series D round that now totals $106m.
Financial services firm BNP Paribas and private equity firm Magnesium Capital co-led the second tranche, investing with undisclosed others. The first tranche was closed in January 2018 and was funded by Activate Capital, Temasek and Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan.
The extra equity funding was disclosed alongside C$200m ($152m) of project financing from Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan that will support the construction of Stem’s systems in the Canadian province of Ontario, following its entry into Canada in January this year.
Founded in 2009, Stem offers clients a subscription-based system enabling them to utilise energy storage systems produced by suppliers such as Tesla, Panasonic and LG Chem that function as virtual power plants. More than 800 systems have been deployed through Stem so far.
The company has also developed a system that uses artificial intelligence to optimise the timing of the energy supply and assess the most beneficial times for its users to make money supplying power to the external energy market.
Stem has now raised $219m in equity and debt financing altogether, closing a $27m round featuring GE Ventures and Total Energy Ventures, respective subsidiaries of industrial equipment maker GE and oil and gas supplier Total, as well as power producers Iberdrola and Exelon, and Angeleno Group in 2015.
Diversified conglomerate Mitsui and RWE Supply & Trading, a division of energy utility RWE, contributed to a $45m round Stem closed later the same year, before growth equity firm Mithril Capital Management invested another $15m in mid-2016.
John Carrington, Stem’s chief executive, said on Tuesday: “Stem continues to attract top-tier international asset management interest in our ability to transform electricity grids with vast energy storage networks and our superior artificial intelligence platform.”