SET Ventures has led a funding round into European flexible solutions provider ESFORIN SE, with sonnen founder Christoph Ostermann also participating.
The funding – which also comes from existing shareholders – will support ESFORIN in expanding its team, scaling up client engagement and delivery capabilities and investing in international expansion to strengthen its market leadership.
The company operates an automated system to monetise the flexibility of industrial and generation energy assets for its clients on the intraday markets through algorithmic trading.
This enables a far wider range of energy assets to contribute to the stability of the energy system, ESFORIN said, than only the assets that meet the strict technical requirements for the control need of grid operators.
Anton Arts, managing partner of SET Ventures, praised ESFORIN for having solved “one of the most vexing issues of the energy system transition”, how to make contributing to grid stability financially rewarding for industrial companies.
Arts will be joining ESFORIN’s supervisory board, as will Ostermann, who also becomes a shareholder.
In January 2020, SET Ventures raised €100 million to invest in early stage energy companies throughout Europe, with a specific focus on effective balancing of intermittent renewable generation, smart energy distribution and storage, as well as promoting efficient energy use in general.