Cactos, a Finnish start-up turning second-life Tesla electric vehicle batteries into smart energy storage units, says it has secured €2.5 million in new funding to continue the company’s growth.
Credit: Cactos
The new funding round was led by Superhero Capital, with participation from Cactos’s founders, and infuses €2.5 million in equity and debt into the company’s plans to expand.
Cactos will use the new funding to drive production of new energy storage facilities and the expansion of the company’s current Muhos plant, which has reached the limits of its current production capacity in just a few months due to significant demand.
The funding will also support international projects, meeting increased demand brought about by the ongoing energy transition and Europe’s current energy crisis.
“Our first year of operation is coming to a close,” said Oskari Jaakkola, CEO and founder of Cactos.
“In the first semester, we brought to the market one of the world’s most advanced energy storage systems. Following the roll-out, market demand for our product has been exceptionally strong, and the funding we raised will help us to fully respond to this demand.
Cactos operates a fleet of distributed energy storage systems made from re-used Tesla EV batteries and its own proprietary cloud-based control software.
Each Tesla EV battery is disassembled, inspected, and tested at Cactos’ factory in Muhos, Finland, before being converted into 100kWh energy storage units.
Meanwhile, Cactos Spine, the company’s algorithmic-based cloud computing service, controls and optimises the energy storage units, enabling consistent energy supply through usage peaks or blackouts, as well as optimisation that maximises the benefit of lower electricity prices.
“On the ground, companies are concerned about electricity supply and market volatility,” said Jaakkola.
“The coming winter will clearly be a very difficult one, but the longer-term outlook with energy transition and temporal imbalance in supply and demand means there is a huge need for demand response and different ways to store energy.
“There is an acute need for smart energy storage systems to support the global transition to a greener world,” added Jussi Pyörre, partner at Superhero Capital.
Joshua S. Hill is a Melbourne-based journalist who has been writing about climate change, clean technology, and electric vehicles for over 15 years. He has been reporting on electric vehicles and clean technologies for Renew Economy and The Driven since 2012. His preferred mode of transport is his feet.