Sunamp, the heat energy storage leader, has raised £3.2 million in its latest funding round led by an international private investor in the energy market. Sunamp designs and manufactures non-toxic, compact Heat Batteries that store heat from renewable and nonrenewable sources, cutting both fuel costs and carbon emissions.
Existing investors, including Scottish Investment Bank, Par Equity, Equity Gap, Highland Venture Capital and Old College Capital, also participated in this round. The money will be used to fund the company’s expansion to meet market demand, to enter international markets and for product advancement.
Sunamp is gearing up to take on competitors including Tesla Motors, which has also entered the energy storage market. The company was founded by veteran technology entrepreneur Andrew Bissell, who sold his previous company, the 3D medical imaging business Voxar, for €39 million to Barco NV in 2004.
Andrew Bissell said: “We are grateful to our investors for their vote of confidence in our products and our business model. Our team’s mission is to grow the business nationally and internationally, making Sunamp Heat Batteries the “go to” solution for heat energy storage. Sunamp PV heat batteries are now helping to cut carbon emissions and lower fuel bills in over 700 homes thanks, in part, to a competitively won £3.2m grant from the Local Energy Challenge Fund, and we have proved our abilities as a volume manufacturer.”
“The global thermal energy storage market is expected to reach $1.8 billion by 2020 and we are excited about the potential of our product to solve a world-wide problem. We are now ready for the next phase of expansion, and have our sights set on the North American markets, Europe and Asia-Pacific. This additional funding will help us to broaden our market reach and to continue our impressive product development.”
Sunamp heat batteries use a novel phase-change material developed with the University of Edinburgh which store four times more heat than hot water tanks of the same size. This technology underpins a portfolio of products including SunampPV, a super-compact 5 kWh Heat Battery which allows homes with solar panels to store excess energy for future use rather than sending it to the grid. SunampStack is a fridge-freezer sized appliance storing 40 kWh, which saves consumers and businesses up to 50% of their heating bills by optimising the operation of renewable heat sources such as heat pumps.
SunampCube, which is currently being developed, will be scalable up to ISO shipping container size and transportable. It responds to the need for commercial and industrial scale heat storage to deal with grid constraints and waste heat recovery and delivery.
Jock Millican from Equity Gap said: “Equity Gap members have continued to support Sunamp in this round. I believe this latest investment will allow the company to focus on achieving real commercial traction while continuing to develop applications for their products.”
