Nexeon raises £10M for lithium-ion batteries

Stealthy Oxfordshire, UK-based energy storage startup Nexeon Limited raised £10 million ($14.2 million) to continue development of its silicon-based anodes for lithium-ion batteries.

Nexeon, a spinout of the Imperial College London, also plans to build a pilot manufacturing facility with the new funds, which follow a £4.25 million round in July 2007.

The company has grown within the Imperial Innovations incubator, which seeks to commercialize technologies developed by the university's professors. Nexeon was founded by Department of Electrical Engineering Professor Mino Green.

The fund-raising was announced today by PUK Ventures, which contributed £1 million in this round, as well as during the July 2007 funding. Invesco Perpetual contributed £5 million this round, and Imperial College venture arm Imperial Innovations invested £4 million.

Nexeon has developed a number of proprietary processes and machines for producing the material and for making electrodes, PUK says.

The company plans to sell non-exclusive licenses for its technology.

"The market for lithium-ion batteries is currently worth over $8 billion in 2008 and forecast to grow strongly, which makes us very excited about the future of the business,” said Christina McComb, head of PUK Ventures, in a release.

For three years, Nexeon has been working in stealth mode to increase the energy storage of battery technology based on silicon anodes for lithium-ion batteries.

The company has 12 patent families in progress and has filed for several patents covering a unique solution to the well known cyclelife problem with Silicon, PUK says.One patent family has been granted.

The company is targeting an already-busy sector of cleantech as companies aim to develop longer-lasting and more powerful rechargeable batteries for consumer devices and vehicles.

In January, Westborough, Mass.-based lithium-ion battery maker Boston-Power said it raised a $55 million venture capital round to help it meet demand for its lithium ion battery for notebook computers but said it also planned to target the vehicle market (see Boston-Power eyes vehicle market as it gets $55M funding). A few weeks earlier, Boston-Power gained the spotlight after revealing it was chosen to provide its Sonata battery as an upgrade to Hewlett-Packard (NYSE: HPQ) notebook PCs starting early this year. 

In December, Littleton, Colo.-based Infinite Power Solutions said it raised $13 million to ramp the company as it begins shipping solid-state, rechargeable thin-film batteries (see Infinite Power raises $13M to ramp thin-film batteries). Later that month, Menlo Park, Calif.-based Imara emerged from stealth mode to announce it plans to begin producing its high-power rechargeable lithium ion batteries in 2009 for applications such as power tools, lawn equipment and electric motorcycles (see Battery maker Imara emerges from stealth).

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