Trameto, the innovator of smarter energy harvesting power management ICs (EH PMIC), announced yesterday it has successfully closed the second round of seed funding with investment partners the Development Bank of Wales and u-blox AG (SIX:UBXN), a leading global provider of positioning and wireless communication technologies and services. The Development Bank of Wales is an existing equity investor and board observer, and u-blox AG will also join the board as an observer.
Commenting on the investment, Huw Davies, CEO and co-founder, says, “This funding round enables us to embark on the next part of our journey to engage more widely with the market to complete and promote our OptiJoule® energy harvesting PMIC solutions. Meeting the demand to remove or reduce the reliance on batteries used in wireless IoT devices is one of the initial application markets we are addressing. OptiJoule’s harvester-agnostic and autonomous approach offers considerable design flexibility and BOM cost savings for IoT device manufacturers.”
Trameto previously received investment from the EU Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme, believed to be the first Welsh company to benefit from the SME Instrument Phase 2 grant initiative. Trameto is also the first European company to be accepted into the Californian-based Silicon Catalyst, the world’s only incubator programme focused exclusively on accelerating semiconductor startups. Trameto’s energy harvesting technology recently gained further industry recognition by winning the Elektra 2021 Power Product of the Year award.
“We’re delighted to participate in Trameto’s second round of seed funding,” states Dr. Richard Thompson, Senior Investment Executive, Development Bank of Wales. “Incorporating batteries in an industrial sensor effectively locks in the need to regularly replace them, disrupting production and contributing to high through-life operating and maintenance costs. Trameto’s OptiJoule EH PMICs offer the simplest, most effective, and economical way to create self-sustaining wireless IoT solutions. Huw and the team have made exceptional progress and we look forward to working with Trameto, Silicon Catalyst and now u-blox as our new corporate co-investor ”
Tony Milbourn, Corporate Strategy, u-blox AG comments, “Trameto has a clear vision to help manufacturers adopt an alternative approach to powering IoT devices. Unlike existing energy harvesting techniques that require significant design effort for different harvester types, OptiJoule autonomously adapts to any, many, and multiple harvester technologies.”
