Skeleton Technologies and Marubeni Corporation have announced a strengthening of their long-term partnership with a significant investment from the Japanese conglomerate in Skeleton. The investment will contribute to Skeleton’s manufacturing expansion to meet the rapidly expanding demand for SuperBatteries.
Skeleton’s SuperBattery energy storage cells are based on Skeleton’s proprietary Curved Graphene raw material, allowing for a long lifetime (50,000 charge-discharge cycles), high power, energy density comparable to high-power batteries, and excellent safety. The first SuperBattery cells come in the supercapacitor industry standard D60 large cell form factor.
Taavi Madiberk, Co-Founder and CEO of Skeleton Technologies commented: “We are proud and thankful for the support and trust from Marubeni Corporation. Marubeni is way more than an investor, it is a strategic partner for Skeleton and has been instrumental in enabling us to achieve excellent commercial traction in Asia, particularly in heavy-duty equipment and vehicles, and in the automotive sector. We are very satisfied with the market’s interest in our SuperBattery and we now need to expand our manufacturing capacity to meet the customers’ demand. We will continue to work hard together with Marubeni, while benefitting from its global business network and experience in the energy sector.“
Masayuki Omoto, COO of Next Generation Business Development Division of Marubeni Corporation, said: “Since Marubeni joined Skeleton as a strategic partner in March 2021, we have received enthusiastically positive feedback to Skeleton’s products from global manufacturing companies, and collaborated on the development of SuperBattery applications. Recognizing the substantial potential in the field of heavy-duty electrification, electrified and hybrid vehicles, and grid energy storage, we believe our investment will help Skeleton fortify mass production capabilities for SuperBattery, bring the SuperBattery to customers in the fastest manner and fuel company growth. Considering the market demand for high-power batteries and supercapacitors, we clearly see Skeleton transforming into one of the leading and truly next-generation battery companies in the world.”
Diego Pavia, CEO of EIT InnoEnergy, stated: “We are one of the early investors in several European champions in the battery value chain, with several having reached the industrial Unicorn status. We see Skeleton, which we entered 7 years ago, scaling up rapidly and following a similar path, contributing to further addressing the European battery demand. Marubeni’s investment is one of the top strategic deals in the European battery industry this year and, it is a testament to the excellent work done by Taavi and the entire Skeleton team. It showcases how to take a deeptech company to the market, continue executing the strategy, and grow shareholder value in all market conditions.”
Skeleton has validated its technology and competitive advantage in real-life applications and focuses on the high-power, fast-charging segment of energy storage technologies, filling an important market gap. Skeleton is currently ramping up manufacturing of its supercapacitors product line with a new factory near Leipzig (Germany), and planning for the production scale-up of its SuperBattery product.
The commercial cooperation between Skeleton and Marubeni covers Asia, excluding China and India. The Japanese conglomerate with over €50 billion of annual revenue sells Skeleton’s products in the region, supports commercial scale-up and customer acquisition for Skeleton’s Superbattery in Asian markets and uses its relationships with existing clients to develop new applications for Skeleton’s patented curved graphene material.
