UK’s cleantech startup Brill Power secures €10.2M to make batteries better and smarter

Oxford, UK-based Brill Power, a cleantech platform that develops battery management technology, announced on Wednesday that it has raised $10.5M (approximately €10.27M) in a Series A round of funding. The company aims to make batteries smarter, cleaner, safer and longer-lasting as a critical element of the shift to zero emissions energy.

The round was led by Legal & General Capital and Barclays Sustainable Impact Capital Programme. Existing investors Oxford Science Enterprises, Oxford Investment Consultants and Oxford University also participated in the round. Shell Ventures and Climate KIC also invested in this round.

John Bromley, MD, Clean Energy at Legal & General Capital, says, “As we grow our climate and clean energy platform, investing in Brill Power is an exciting move into energy storage technologies that are crucial to enable an increase of renewables on the power grid, electrification of transport, and to power our homes, businesses and key infrastructure. Through extended lifetimes, improved safety, and waste reduction, Brill Power’s work is setting a new standard for how to store and use clean power to accelerate progress to our net zero emissions goals.”

Capital utilisation

Following the funding round, Brill Power has three plans. Based on its projects finished with Aston Martin, AMTE Power, and Delta Cosworth, the company will double the size of its team across both engineering and commercial operations. It will also expand its product range for both static energy storage and for the world’s largest battery market – electric vehicles. 

The proceeds will also help further develop the company’s data platform, BrillAnalytics, to enable users to remotely monitor and forecast battery safety, health, and performance data.

Brill Power’s CEO, Dr Christoph Birkl, says, “At Brill, we have made great strides over the past two years. We have a ground-breaking commercial product in the marketplace and a pipeline of new developments and products to address the stationary energy storage and automotive markets. We now have the means to act on the opportunity to offer the market a step-change in improvements for zero-emissions technologies – for the benefit of our investors, our customers and also the community we serve.”

About Brill Power

Founded in 2016 by Adrien Bizeray, Carolyn Hicks, Christoph Birkl, and Damien Frost, Brill Power is an Oxford University spin-out that develops battery management technology to increase the lifetime performance of lithium-ion battery packs.

The company’s mission is to maximise the potential of battery management systems to enhance performance and lower ownership costs of stationary and motive power batteries to provide sustainable technology for society.

Brill claims that its optimised Active Loading method increases battery life by up to 60 per cent and allows used batteries to discharge up to 46 per cent more energy through a proprietary combination of hardware and intelligent software.

The company’s technology is an important enabler for battery systems in a variety of settings, such as office and industrial buildings, on- and off-grid energy storage, residential structures, and electric cars.