Neara closes Series C fundraise, led by some of the world’s largest private market investors and infrastructure owners, cementing its position as a global leader in critical infrastructure resiliency
SEATTLE, Oct. 30, 2024 — Neara, the first AI-powered predictive modeling software platform for critical infrastructure, today announced a US$31 million Series C funding round. The round was anchored by a consortium led by EQT (a leading global investment organization), with participation from Partners Group (one of the largest firms in the global private markets industry1) and Square Peg Capital (one of the company’s earliest investors), with additional support from existing investors Skip Capital and Prosus Ventures.
The funding will accelerate Neara’s global operations across the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe, and Asia Pacific as the company continues to address the increasing challenges of energy resilience and infrastructure modernization.
With operations across four continents, Neara’s 3D digital modeling technology enables utilities to adopt a more proactive approach to network optimization with simulations that surface safety and reliability risks and identify the most effective remediation actions. Neara’s utility partners, including CenterPoint Energy and Southern California Edison in the US, perform critical analyses in just hours and days that would otherwise take months or years. These analyses enable utilities to execute faster, more informed decisions about a wide range of issues, from routine operations and load growth planning to emergency scenarios and double and triple-digit million-dollar grid hardening decisions without the need for verification from manual surveys.
CenterPoint Energy partnered with Neara following 2024’s Hurricane Beryl to forecast, measure, and deliver network improvements as part of their mission to build the most resilient coastal grid in the country. Already, CenterPoint has dramatically accelerated critical field insight analysis, reducing processes that historically took a year and a half to just three hours in Neara.
Southern California Edison counts on Neara’s technology to address problematic vegetation 50% faster in their wildfire-prone region.
As global energy challenges intensify, the public sector increasingly recognizes the role of technology in driving data-informed decisions and aligning public and private stakeholders behind the most critical projects to ensure timely funding and execution. Neara’s network-wide simulations help utilities gain regulatory support by objectively demonstrating how proposed upgrades, such as wind-resistant poles and flood-resilient network design, will improve reliability and resiliency. Neara’s software helps utilities significantly reduce outages, accelerate power restoration, and bring new infrastructure online much faster.
The company’s technology is also playing a central role in the energy transition by significantly simplifying the traditionally complex challenges of transmission design and construction hurdles. The simulation functionality also empowers utilities to optimize the utilization of existing infrastructure, accelerating the integration of renewable energy sources.
“We are asking the grid to do more in the next 10 years than we have in the last 50. Neara helps strengthen critical infrastructure to keep global communities safe, connected, and economically viable despite intensifying severe weather, age, and overuse. Reliable, affordable, clean energy depends on resilient high-functioning infrastructure, which demands the laser-focused, fast decision-making we’re empowering for utilities,” said Jack Curtis, Chief Commercial Officer at Neara.
The investment builds on Neara’s last funding round in September of 2023. Since then, the TIME 100 Most Influential Companies honoree has focused on scaling its presence in the United States and Europe. Globally, Neara has modeled over >1.5 million square miles of electricity infrastructure and 12 million infrastructure assets.
This funding round will accelerate Neara’s global operations as utilities worldwide face increasing resiliency challenges and the demands of the energy transition. The company will also expand its modeling and simulation capabilities to additional critical infrastructure sectors, including telecommunications and public transportation. Neara is already supporting broadband infrastructure projects in the US, helping providers fast-track efforts to connect underserved communities.
“This investment marks EQT’s first venture growth investment in an Australia-headquartered company, highlighting our ambition to support world-class platforms from early growth partnerships through to large-cap buyouts. We are excited to further advance Neara’s growth and impact by leveraging our global network and expertise across energy transition, infrastructure augmentation and best-in-class software development,” said Frank Heckes, Partner on the EQT Private Equity advisory team and Co-Head of EQT Private Capital Australia and New Zealand. “EQT is focused on making responsible investments that address global challenges and drive innovation for a better future. Neara exemplifies this by empowering mission-critical service providers to enhance infrastructure reliability and efficiency, unlocking bottlenecks, and accelerating energy transition in key markets,” added Sam Franklin, Managing Director on the EQT Infrastructure advisory team.
Cyrus Driver, Managing Director at Partners Group, said, “In many cases, infrastructure is lagging behind rapidly changing societal needs, including across the energy grid, transportation, and digital infrastructure. As a result, it’s never been more important that every dollar invested in infrastructure demonstrably improves performance. Neara’s industry-leading technology is essential for every asset owner to run high-functioning and resilient infrastructure. We have deep thematic conviction in Neara’s offering and we are already working with management on multiple opportunities to deploy its solutions within Partners Group’s global network.”
James Tynan, Partner at Square Peg, explained, “For most of us, infrastructure is invisible until there is a problem, but then it can be a matter of life and death. With infrastructure under pressure like never before, Neara’s unique ability to help intelligently and cost-effectively manage these critical assets could not be more important. At Square Peg, we concentrate our investments around a small number of outlier teams attacking critical, global problems, and we’re proud to be continuing to back Neara almost four years into our journey with them.”
About Neara
Neara’s AI-assisted predictive modeling software helps infrastructure owners drive critical proactive decisions by conducting precise analyses in hours and days that would otherwise take months or years in the field. Network-wide simulation analyses reveal how assets behave in real-world environments during any scenario — empowering better, faster, more cost-effective decisions. The model supports end-to-end network governance, from routine operational decisions to emergency scenarios and major grid-hardening investments — without verification from manual surveys. Neara’s technology has modeled >1.5 million square miles of global network territory featuring ~10 million assets, across four continents from California to Ireland and Australia. Neara’s utility customers identify outage risks 9x faster, restore power 3x faster, and save thousands of field visits per year. More information is available at www.neara.com.
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About EQT
EQT is a purpose-driven global investment organization with EUR 246 billion in total assets under management (EUR 134 billion in fee-generating assets under management), within two business segments – Private Capital and Real Assets. EQT owns portfolio companies and assets in Europe, Asia Pacific and the Americas and supports them in achieving sustainable growth, operational excellence and market leadership. More info: www.eqtgroup.com. Follow EQT on LinkedIn, X, YouTube and Instagram.
About Square Peg
Square Peg is a venture capital firm that helps founders from our corners of the world shape the future. Founded in 2012 in Australia, Square Peg combines the best of a local partner with a global network of companies and now backs founders early and repeatedly from three of technology’s most exciting regions: Australia & New Zealand, Israel, and Southeast Asia. Learn more at squarepeg.vc
About Partners Group
Partners Group is one of the largest firms in the global private markets industry, with around 1,800 professionals and approximately USD 150 billion in assets under management. The firm has investment programs and custom mandates spanning private equity, private credit, infrastructure, real estate, and royalties. With its heritage in Switzerland and its primary presence in the Americas in Colorado, Partners Group is built differently from the rest of the industry. The firm leverages its differentiated culture and its operationally oriented approach to identify attractive investment themes and to transform businesses and assets into market leaders. For more information, please visit www.partnersgroup.com or follow us on LinkedIn.
1 Acting on behalf of its clients
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