Solid-oxide specialist in negotiations with
investors over €200m financing round, according to business daily
Handelsblatt
German electrolyser maker Sunfire may soon be valued at more than €1bn
($1.06bn) after a new €200m financing round, according to respected
daily business newspaper Handelsblatt.
Sunfire — which produces both solid-oxide and pressurised alkaline
electrolysers — is in talks with investors about the funding, which,
if secured, would effectively set the company’s worth at over
€1bn, said the German publication, citing “financial circles”.
“With regard to our further financing, we currently have nothing to
announce. Of course, as a rapidly growing company, we are in constant
contact with investors,” a Sunfire spokesperson told Handelsblatt.
The company closed a €195m Series D funding round in March last year,
which followed a €109m capital raise in October 2021. According to
market analyst Pitchbook, last year's funding already gave Sunfire a
valuation of $1.7bn.
The Dresden-based company was launched in 2010 and was a pioneer in
high-temperature solid-oxide electrolysers (SOE) — which can produce
up to 30% more hydrogen per kWh of electricity than alkaline or PEM
machines when utilising waste heat from industrial processes.
Other companies have, however, caught up, with Bloom Energy in the US
already having an SOE production capacity of 2GW, and Topsoe building
a 500MW SOE factory in Denmark and sealing a 5GW order from US company
First Ammonia.
Sunfire acquired alkaline electrolysis company IHT in 2020, and is due
to complete a 500MW pressurised alkaline electrolyser factory in
Germany this year, which would make it the joint 15th-largest
manufacturer (of alkaline or PEM electrolysers) in the world,
according to research house BloombergNEF.
Pressurised alkaline electrolysers are said to be as efficient and
able to quickly ramp up and down in line with variable renewables
supply as PEM machines, but cheaper to produce, without the need for
expensive iridium and platinum catalysts.
