SAN LEANDRO, Calif., Feb. 13, 2023 — Quino Energy, a startup commercializing a water-based organic flow battery technology licensed from Harvard University, announced that it has closed an additional $1.25M of funding to augment its recent Series Seed raise of $3.3M led by ANRI, one of the most active seed and early stage VC firms in Japan. This Series Seed Expansion brings the total raised in the investment round to $4.55M. This funding augments $1.0M previously raised in pre-seed funding and $4.6M awarded to the company in a non-dilutive grant from the U.S. Department of Energy.
The funding group includes new investors Energy Revolution Ventures and Doral Energy Tech Ventures, while TechEnergy Ventures increased the size of their earlier investment. They join ANRI, TechEnergy Ventures, and another confidential strategic investor as major Series Seed investors.
“Quino Energy has developed a revolutionary battery that will shape the future of grid-scale energy storage. We are incredibly impressed with Eugene Beh and his team’s technology, which delivers significant improvements in battery cost, lifetime, and safety,” says Peter Robson, Managing Director of Energy Revolution Ventures. “We believe Quino will play a vital role in the new Age of Electrochemical Power and are excited to support Eugene and his team on their journey.”
“At Doral, we align closely with Quino’s mission of developing a cheap, clean, and efficient flow battery, relying on affordable organic materials,” adds Guy Yavin, Investment Director at Doral Energy Tech Ventures. “The shortage of precious minerals and metals has held back the scale-up of new battery technologies and deep adoption of storage technologies to be embedded within renewable energy projects. Quino’s multi-hour battery has the potential to increase the reliance on renewable energy electricity, and we are looking forward to supporting the team in this venture.”
The new funding will augment Quino Energy’s push to further scale and demonstrate its in situ, zero-waste battery electrolyte production process that turns dyestuff chemicals made from coal tar into high-performance, long lifetime battery reactants using the flow battery system itself as the chemical reactor. Demonstrations are envisioned at commercially relevant scales at external sites in addition to an onsite microgrid at the company’s lab in San Leandro, California. Formed by combining a commercial rooftop solar system with one of the company’s prototypes, the onsite microgrid will enable Quino Energy to move its office operations off-grid while simultaneously collecting real-world field testing data.
“Our technology enables a 100% domestic supply chain without any reliance on critical minerals, saves jobs by developing a major new use for coal that doesn’t involve burning it, and accelerates the decarbonization of our economy all at once,” explains Eugene Beh, co-founder and CEO of Quino Energy. “This investment is a strong mandate to make rapid progress on commercializing organic flow battery systems that manufacture their own active materials through our process. We think that we can rapidly bring down the cost of mid-duration (8-40 hour) battery storage by leveraging existing supply chains of battery hardware. We’re grateful to our investors and the Department of Energy for sharing and supporting our vision for the future of grid energy storage.”
About Quino Energy
Formed in 2021, Quino Energy is a start-up company that is developing water-based flow batteries that store electrical energy in organic molecules called quinones, for commercial and grid applications. These batteries are predicted to enjoy a unique combination of low capital cost, true fire safety, rapid scalability, and local manufacturability. This is made possible by a number of technological breakthroughs, some of which were first discovered at Harvard University and later licensed by Quino Energy. Please visit quinoenergy.com for more details on the team and the technology.
About Energy Revolution Ventures
Energy Revolution Ventures has established itself as one of the premier venture capital investors in the field of investing in pre-Seed, Seed and Series A+ start-ups, developing scalable technologies around the electrochemical ecosystem. It is leveraging years of experience of its shareholders turning energy and battery technologies into successful, publicly traded businesses. ERV has a deep understanding of the fundamental technology behind innovations as well as risks to scale and commercialization. ERV is an active investor, supporting founders and innovators functionally and at the board level. For more information, visit www.erv.io.
About Doral Energy Tech Ventures
Doral Energy-Tech Ventures is the innovation and investment arm of the Doral Group, a global renewable energy and environmental infrastructure developer. Doral-Tech partners with inspiring entrepreneurs to build breakthrough companies taking on major global sustainability challenges. Doral-Tech invests in promising energy innovators, providing the expertise, capital and strategic support to bring to market groundbreaking technologies in a range of renewable energy and clean-tech related fields. For more information, visit www.doral-tech.com.
SOURCE Quino Energy
