MAGNOTHERM closes €6.3 million seed funding round to mass produce first sustainable refrigerator

The climate tech startup MAGNOTHERM has successfully closed its seed financing of 6.3 million with lead investor Extantia, Revent, BMH Beteiligungs-Managementgesellschaft Hessen, LAUDA Dr. R. WOBSER Beteiligungs-mbH as well as Katrin Pucknat, Arne Stoschek, Willi Tscheschner,and Christoph Behn through the business angel club better ventures. The investment will be used for the series production of the world’s first sustainable refrigerator, which already has a paying clientele.

MAGNOTHERM develops and builds highly efficient and sustainable cooling systems based on magnetic materials. Instead of climate-damaging, explosive or toxic cooling gases, the climate tech startup uses a temperature-active metal that cools down a mixture of water. The founders have already received several awards for their work, including the Hessischer Gründerpreis.

MAGNOTHERM revolutionizes the climate-damaging cooling market

The energy saving potential in the cooling market is huge. Commercially available cooling systems cause about 10 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. In addition, there are emissions from the refrigerants in these cooling systems, such as hydrofluorocarbons, which have up to 600 times the global warming potential of carbon dioxide and are regularly released when they are scrapped. Replacing these harmful refrigerants could avoid 1.3 gigatons of CO2e per year. This is exactly where MAGNOTHERM comes in. MAGNOTHERM’s revolutionary technology has many potential applications for any type of refrigeration – from refrigerators to air conditioners to hydrogen liquefaction.

With the new capital, the founders plan to go into mass production of their already commercially successful beverage refrigerator, introduce a 3kW refrigerated shelf for food retail, and have their magnetic hydrogen liquefaction validated in the lab with the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR). The startup’s big goal: to establish their solution as an industry standard to combat climate change.

MAGNOTHERM develops sustainable cooling systems thanks to magnetic cooling

„Our magnetic cooling is not only up to 40 percent more efficient than conventional solutions, but also produces no direct greenhouse gases. With POLARIS, we have developed the first magnetic beverage cooler, making us the world’s first commercial supplier of this technology at room-temperature. With the financing, we are pushing ahead with the series production of our beverage cooler and accelerating the market development for sustainable refrigerated shelves in food retail,“ comments Timur SİRMAN, Co-CEO of MAGNOTHERM, on the financing round.

„We have been following the team at MAGNOTHERM for a long time and are really impressed with them! Their highly efficient and sustainable cooling systems are the result of years of research, and they are pioneering a technology that will be part of everyday life in the future – be it through the preservation of products or as a key element of the hydrogen economy. As true pioneers who have found a smart solution to an important climate problem, Timur and Maximilian are poised to accelerate their journey to commercialize a scientific breakthrough,“ said Torben Schreiter, Partner at Extantia Capital.

„The issue of cooling will become more important in an increasingly warmer world. But conventional cooling systems consume too much energy to support this change in a sustainable way. We must now do everything we can to make cooling technology massively more energy efficient. MAGNOTHERM shows that this is possible using deep tech,“ says Tina Dreimann, founder and managing director of better ventures.

„As the world market leader, we want to improve the world together with exact temperatures – that is our vision and we put it into practice every day. In the future, energy-efficient systems will be needed that conserve resources and minimize climate-damaging emissions. MAGNOTHERM is taking a decisive step forward here, which fits well with our technological competence as a world market leader. With our investment, we are laying the foundation for successful cooperation between start-up and industry and can benefit from each other,“ states Managing Partner of LAUDA, Dr. Gunther Wobser.

“We are thrilled to have supported MAGNOTHERM as financial advisor with their successful seed round“, says Laurent Guyard, CEO of Proof of Concept Partners.

Multi-award-winning startup that combines science with practice

MAGNOTHERM develops and builds highly efficient and sustainable cooling solutions based on magnetic materials. Instead of gas-vapor refrigerants, the novel magnetic cooling technology uses the magnetocaloric effect in iron-based alloys. MAGNOTHERM was spun out of Technische Universität Darmstadt in 2019. With Co-CEOs Timur SİRMAN and Dr. Maximilian Fries, CTO Dimitri Benke, CPO Jeffrey Pickett, and Advisors Prof. Dr. Oliver Gutfleisch and Dr. Tino Gottschall, the six-member founding team is made up of scientists in physics and materials science. Together with their team, which combines special know-how from the fields of materials science and plant engineering, they want to revolutionize the cooling industry – and above all make it sustainable.

About Extantia Capital

Extantia Capital is a climate-first venture capital firm accelerating the path to a decarbonised world. Extantia unites mission-driven entrepreneurs, scientists, investors, and business leaders to advance the transition. The €300M platform includes Extantia Flagship, a fund backing scalable deep decarbonisation companies, Extantia Allstars, a fund-of-funds investing in climate venture capital funds, and Extantia Ignite, a sustainability hub advancing knowledge and competence in climate innovation and ESG practices.

About Revent VC

Revent is a 60M € Venture Capital Fund, headquartered in Berlin, investing across Europe, in mission-driven founders leveraging technology to drive systemic change across Climate, Healthcare, and Economic Empowerment.

About better ventures

better ventures is an angel club for impact-driven startups initiated by Tina Dreimann, Dr. Cedric Duvinage and Christoph Behn. More than 60 successful entrepreneurs have joined forces in the Angel Club to support ambitious founders with capital, network and know-how to sustainably improve the world with their business models.

About BMH

BMH Beteiligungs-Managementgesellschaft Hessen, based in Wiesbaden, was founded in 2001 and is a wholly owned subsidiary of Landesbank Hessen Thuringen Girozentrale (Helaba). Through Wirtschafts- und Infrastrukturbank Hessen (WIBank), BMH is actively involved in the economic development activities of the State of Hesse. As a medium-sized investment and venture capital company, BMH bundles public investment interests and financing instruments for early-stage, growth and medium-sized companies in Hesse. BMH currently manages seven investment funds with a total invested investment volume of around 125 million euros. Since its foundation, BMH has invested in a total of more than 500 companies. The investment focus is on the software & IT, life sciences, mechanical and plant engineering, industrial goods, professional services and e-commerce sectors, among others. More information about BMH and its funds: www.bmh-hessen.de

About Proof of Concept Partners

POC Partners founded in 2013 is providing coaching and advisory services to seed & early stage deep-tech startups in the Cleantech, Energy & Industrial Biotech industries across Europe.