Providing energy beyond the power grid 

Emost was founded with a simple yet profound question in mind: "What does life look like in a sustainable world for all the applications at the edge or beyond the power grid?" For the co-founders the answer lay in providing mobile batteries to deliver electricity where it was otherwise inaccessible, solving the critical issue of the last mile.

"There is a massive infrastructure problem for industrial sized applications, and we need an economically viable solution that is easy to use. Anything else is just a drop in the ocean," Benedikt Domke, CEO and co-founder of emost, explains.

The intrapreneurship team ended up with their own startup

The path to establishing emost was unconventional. At the time a customer approached the Axpo renewable team with a problem: he needed an alternative to diesel generators on a construction site due to noise restrictions and the impracticality of long temporary grid cables. In response, the team developed a battery system that was capable of transporting energy to provide an island grid, to boost an existing weak grid for bigger applications, or to run as hybrid “fuel saver” system with existing generators. Over the next five and a half years the system evolved into a decentral microgrid capable of integrating with the existing infrastructure.

"We had a great solution and some very early successes, but scaling emost within Axpo was a challenge. Axpo with its setup and processes wasn't the ideal owner for the scaling phase. After fruitful discussions with management, we agreed on doing a management buy-out with external investors who understood and supported the young and rapidly growing idea." Benedikt describes it as "the chance of a lifetime."

The right timing (and bit of luck)

Initially, emost's technology was ahead of the market. Early reactions were lukewarm, with potential clients expressing interest but not willing to invest in the nascent technology. This changed dramatically when the energy price increased shortly before the Ukraine conflict.

"In the year of the buyout, we had the best start we could ask for. We were sold out and price didn’t matter," Benedikt recalls. Some of those developments were normalized when the construction sector faced more difficult times in the end of 2023. Despite these fluctuations, emost's sales growth has remained strong, with new opportunities also arising from industries like film production, event catering, emergency response and other industries. “Our timing was perfect – we have an easy to use, well-functioning and scalable product just as the market is growing rapidly”.

Finding the right investors

Startups with a hardware component face unique challenges compared to software startups. Benedikt comments "there is a saying that hardware is hard. For our first raise we additionally were in the midst of the buy-out process. That required a lot of trust from our investors and I’m very grateful that we found three amazing parties who contribute with capital but also relevant expertise: a construction entrepreneur, a business angel, and a VC."

Emost is quickly building its channels. A major customer win was securing a deal with a German construction machinery manufacturer with two billion revenues as OEM partner. This manufacturer will distribute emost's products across Europe under its own brand. This deal, which took one and a half years of negotiations, is expected to boost emost's growth significantly. In the coming months, emost aims to continue the broadening of the customer base. To step up the marketing and sales activities and fund the internationalization, they plan to raise a five million CHF round. Part of the proceeds will also be invested into the further development of software to enable new microgrid capabilities and some new features on the hardware side. "We want to meet additional customer demands from our backlog and push forward with internationalization," Benedikt explains.

Building a winning team

Building the right team was crucial for emost's success. The broad and diverse experience in the founding team was a good, broad basis. Initial hires were recruited from the founders’ network. However, the advice from the invested VC led to the early hiring of an HR professional, which proved to be a game-changer. Benedikt emphasizes, "hiring HR early significantly improved the speed and quality of the team members and allowed us to build a stellar team fast. As HR is not yet a full-time position, we were lucky to find a person with Danijela who also supported our business in various positions. Getting a look into different roles allows her to better select the right team members. For fast growing teams, getting an HR person onboard early on is a great move I would never have done without the advice of our board. Now we have an ex-purchasing manager from Strabag, a JP Morgan banker, a Boring Company engineer and other top talents that joined our quest. One trait we look for in any new team-member is flexibility and teamwork – the whole team works as an amazing unit helping each other out where necessary.”

SEF Growth: an excellence label

Emost was awarded the SEF.Growth award. During the process an expert jury looked at the business model and current status in detail, awarding emost their label of excellence SEF.Growth. In the process the experts also supported with ideas and practical tips – especially how the international expansion can be accelerated with the right licensing strategy. 

Overall, emost's journey highlights the challenges and rewards of innovating in the hardware space. With a dedicated team and strategic vision, Benedikt and his team continue to push the boundaries of mobile energy solutions, making significant strides in a rapidly evolving market. “We are always eager to find partners joining our journey – customers, service partners, investors, employees – we always look at growing our network to enable the energy transition beyond the grid,” says Benedikt.