en.Wedoany.com Reported - Dutch startup Ore Energy has completed a $43 million (approximately €39.5 million) Series A funding round, led by venture capital firms Plural and HV Capital, with participation from Positron Ventures. Following this round, the Amsterdam-based company has raised over $61 million in total, which will be used to advance the industrialization of its iron-air battery technology.
Ore Energy's iron-air batteries can store electricity continuously for up to 100 hours, whereas traditional lithium-ion batteries typically offer only a few hours of storage. Its working principle is based on the reverse reaction of the oxidation process: during charging, iron oxide is reduced to metallic iron, and during discharging, iron reacts with oxygen in the air through oxidation to release electrical energy. Since only iron, water, and air are used as materials, the system eliminates the need to import critical raw materials such as lithium and cobalt, allowing the supply chain to be fully sourced within Europe. The company claims that the cost per unit of energy capacity for its long-duration energy storage system is approximately one-tenth that of lithium-ion battery technology.
The company is led by co-founder and CEO Aytac Yilmaz, along with Rutil Özdemir and Spanish scientist Yaiza González García. Yilmaz stated that expensive energy is the biggest obstacle to growth, a reality European entrepreneurs and politicians know all too well; renewable, affordable energy is the foundation for the next generation of manufacturing, AI infrastructure, and global industrial growth.
This funding round will be used to build the company's first automated manufacturing plant in Europe, with the goal of achieving gigawatt-hour-scale production by 2028. Ore Energy has signed a long-duration energy storage supply agreement with Dutch energy supplier Budget Thuis to sell 1 GWh of storage capacity, with the first phase of 400 MWh to be delivered in 2028—reportedly the largest agreement of its kind on the European continent. Additionally, under the European StoRIES project framework, the company has completed technical testing with French utility EDF at its Écuelles laboratory.
Ore Energy plans to establish iron-air batteries as "standard grid infrastructure" for long-duration energy storage by 2035, powering heavy industry and continuously expanding data centers.
