Seed capital for Exnaton

Exnaton, ETH Zurich spinoff developing a platform for the energy landscape of tomorrow, has closed its seed financing round led by Global Founders Capital, one of the largest German VC funds. In addition to fresh capital for further growth, GFC brings in its extensive experience from the successful scaling of online business models such as  Zalando, Delivery Hero or Hello Fresh.

Exnaton was founded in 2020, Swiss ClimeTech start-up Exnaton developed “PowerQuartier”, a software platform that offers unprecedented insight into households energy consumption by enabling users to buy renewable energy from local sources using the PowerQuartier app. The software bills energy flows digitally and optimises consumption and supply dynamically at the local level. PowerQuartier creates value from smart meter data and builds the foundation of digital services for energy consumers, such as personalised analyses and remote access to resources like battery storage. Exnaton sells PowerQuartier to utility companies in a software-as-a-service model, to support customers in their transformation towards the digital age where new customer needs in a decentralised energy market take centre stage.

Just earlier this year, Exnaton announced a pre-seed round with business angels from the industry. The start-up has now obtained fresh capital in a seed financing round led by Germany-based Global Founders Capital (GFC) to support further growth in new national markets and expand its user base. In Switzerland and Austria, the start-up has already convinced several utility customers.

“We are convinced that decentralised energy systems, meaning intelligently networked solar installations on buildings, battery storage and charging infrastructure, will be an essential part of the new energy world. While we have come a long way “behind-the-meter”, exciting business models “in front-of-the-meter” are still largely untouched. This is where Exnaton’s solution comes in, enabling the creation and operation of real energy communities and making renewable energy marketable in a decentralised way. We are very much looking forward to supporting the team on their further journey towards a transformed energy market” said Jan Ossenbrink, Partner for Sustainability and ClimeTech at GFC.

In addition to capital, GFC brings in its extensive experience from the successful scaling of online business models (e.g. Zalando, Delivery Hero or Hello Fresh) and supports Exnaton in the search for talent with its global network.

Exnaton further plans to expand the team to fill the business and software development vacancies in the next months. The new hires will join the two recently recruited experts from the energy industry – Kurt Lüscher, former CEO of energy company Energie360°, and Bastian Schwark, Head of Market Operations at SwissGrid, who joined its Board of Directors. Further achievements at Exnaton also include the signing of a partnership with SAP to integrate PowerQuartier into the SAP landscape.

(Press release/RAN)