Membrion, a Seattle, WA-based manufacturer of ultra-low cost, high performance ion exchange membranes, raised $1.8m in funding.
The company has received $1m in the initial close of its seed round, including funding from E8 and the E8 Fund, Bellingham Angel Investors and individual angels. In addition, Membrion received $748k in a grant from America’s Seed Fund, powered by the National Science Foundation.
The company intends to use the funds to expand its team of researchers, continue to scale its technology and develop commercially viable membranes for the ion exchange markets in water separation technologies and energy storage applications.
Founded in 2016 by Dr. Greg Newbloom, based on the technology he developed alongside Professor Lilo Pozzo at the University of Washington’s College of Engineering, spun out of University of Washington, and led by John Plaza, CEO, Membrion leverages silica gel – an inexpensive, non-toxic material that is often packaged with new shoes, beef jerky and many other consumer products – to produce a novel class of commercial ceramic membranes. Its technology converts the absorbent, small-pore silica gel into flexible ceramic membranes that can be engineered to meet the needs of a wide range of applications for clean energy, fresh water supplies and human health challenges.
FinSMEs
11/09/2018