Founded in 2017 by Craig Beddis (CEO), Aidon Hobson-Sayer (CTO) & Miriam Keshani (COO), UK-based Hadean, a metaverse infrastructure startup, has been awarded (with support from Connected Places Catapult) a sizeable grant from UK Research & Innovation. The funding foresees Hedean’s tech being used to generate 3D digital twins, providing road mgmt companies real-time highway data & the capacity to model/ simulate it. Emulating whole corridors of automotive traffic, the platform can be used to plan the right infrastructure upgrades. For e.g. Hadean could benefit engineers working on “e-highways”, one of the most radical upgrades of UK highways in decades, to explore installing overhead eletric power cables on certain routes (which similarly to trolleybus or...

Netherlands-based, PowerField develops, builds & manages solar parks. That is, PV generation facilities (the firm gets its solar panels from Chinese manufacturer Sunova Solar) + charging stations (650 points in operation via its subsidiary PowerGo) + energy/ battery storage systems. Founded in 2016 by Jean-Louis Bertholet (CEO), PowerField has developed <1000 MW of solar parks & the new funding foresees an additional 500 MW. Solar installation capacity will reach 1.1GW in 2023, as such, PowerField owns 10% market share (in the Netherlands). In addition, the startup claims a future pipeline across its three verticals with 2GW in PV generation facilities + 15,000 EV charging stations + <400 MW in battery storage projects. The team wants...