Switzerland-based energy storage technology developer Energy Vault raised $100m yesterday in a series C round featuring telecommunications and internet group SoftBank’s Vision Fund and petroleum supplier Saudi Aramco’s Energy Ventures (SAEV) unit.
Prime Movers Lab led the round, which included Pickering Energy Partners’ Energy Equity Opportunity Fund, Helena, Idealab X, SailingStone Global Energy Transition, AT Gekko, Crexa Capital Advisors, Green Storage Solutions Venture and private investor Gordon Crawford.
Energy Vault is the creator of a gravity-based grid-scale energy storage system that combines low-cost composite bricks and mechanical crane technology with software that autonomously charges and discharges energy.
The cash will support the international roll out of the company’s technology, which will begin in the United States later this year before expanding to markets like Europe, Australia and the Middle East in 2022.
Robert Piconi, Energy Vault’s co-founder and chief executive, said: “The world is at a critical inflection point in the shift towards broader adoption of renewable energy sources.
“Energy Vault is accelerating this transformation as we now move to global deployments and market adoption of the technology to help energy providers and industrial customers more cost-effectively meet their sustainability and decarbonisation goals.”
Vision Fund had previously led Energy Vault’s $110m series B round in August 2019, and although the other participants in that round were not disclosed, it identified SAEV, Prime Movers Lab, Helena and Idealab X as existing backers this week.
The series B funding was announced three months after an investment of undisclosed size by Cemex Ventures, the corporate venturing subsidiary of cement provider Cemex. Goldman Sachs and Stifel were financial advisers on the series C round.
Photo courtesy of Energy Vault, Inc.
