LeydenJar Technologies receives capital injection for revolutionary new battery technology

ECN spin-out LeydenJar Technologies has received a capital injection from UNIIQ, BOM and Energy Professionals. This means that LeydenJar can further work on its invention – a battery that uses silicon anode instead of graphite. The improved lithium-ion battery can store up to 50% more energy which could revolutionize the further development of wireless technologies and electric cars. The funding was announced by Alderman Robert Strijk.

 

Left to right: Hans Dreijklufft (UNIIQ), Robert Strijk, Alderman for Accessibility, Economy, City Centre and Culture at the Municipality of Leiden, Christian Rood (LeydenJar Technologies), Liduina Hammer (UNIIQ), Gabriel de Scheemaker (LeydenJar Technologies) and Suzanne Kroeze (UNIIQ).

The Leidse fles (Leiden bottle), a predecessor of the battery, was invented by Petrus van Musschenbroeck, a professor of physics at Leiden University, in 1749. The Rijksmuseum Boerhaave in Leiden has several in its permanent collection at the museum and in its depot on the Raamsteeg.

Battery development lags behind market demand

The better and more compact storage of energy is the holy grail for technological breakthroughs in several sectors. The further development of electric cars and wireless electronics, for example, is heavily dependent on the availability of batteries that have greater capacity and longer lives. But the annual improvements to the current lithium-ion batteries (Li-ion) are marginal. The bottleneck is that batteries’ anodes (negative pole) is made of graphite, a material that has a limited capacity to connect lithium-ions.

LeydenJar’s silicon anode material promises major improvement

LeydenJar replaced the graphite anode with a 100% silicon anode. This means that the capacity of the batteries in which the anode is the current bottleneck will be ten times more. This in turn will improve the energy storage by 50%. Industry has looked towards silicon to replace graphite for a long time, but silicon has one major drawback. It expands dramatically when being charged, and shrinks again when being used, leaving it brittle and thus breakable. This means that silicon cannot be used as a material for anodes. Only a tiny amount of silicon could be mixed in the graphite.

A 50% increase in energy density thanks to the solar cell technology industry

LeydenJar was able to completely absorb the expanding and shrinking of the silicon by giving the anode a special porous structure that makes it work like a sponge. This invention emerged from ECN’s research on solar cells. The associated plasma process (‘PECVD’) developed by ECN allows the mass production of these types of anodes.

The pure silicon material produced using this method was tested in small batteries (called button cells) last year. The results are so promising that the market is highly interested in testing the material. LeydenJar won the Startup Challenge, a competition for innovative start-ups that move the design of worldwide mobility in the future forward, organized by BMW.

LeydenJar has now received a joint investment of € 550,000 from UNIIQ, the proof-of-concept fund in the province of South Holland, BOM Brabant Ventures, and Energy Professionals, a private investment company. This amount comes on top of the TKI subsidy that LeydenJar Technologies acquired at the end of 2017 along with its TU Delft and ECN partners, and a Metropool Regio Eindhoven subsidy. While the material development will be done in Leiden in UNIIQ’s domain, the process and machine development will be done in Eindhoven, the work area of BOM Brabant Ventures and Metropool Regio Eindhoven.
The investments will enable the continued development of the material and the process to produce a battery that can be used in consumer electronics as a step towards the development of batteries that for electric vehicles and for storage of sustainable energy.

Christian Rood, CEO LeydenJar Technologies, says that “272 years after the Leiden bottle (« Leyden Jar ») was invented, another Dutch invention can again make a significant contribution to the storage of electricity. We are working on this with the best Dutch and German knowledge institutions, European industry, and with our funding partners. This funding gives us the opportunity to make a breakthrough on lithium-ion batteries in the short term, and to use a production method that matches the current Li-ion factory processes.”

Liduina Hammer, UNIIQ Fund Manager, says “UNIIQ invests in promising innovative technological companies in the proof-of-concept phase. The sustainable energy transition is a relevant theme and is one of the priority areas of the South Holland region. We are very happy that we can support the development of this technology and put our first investment in this area into action.”

“BOM Brabant Ventures, the venture arm of the Brabantse Ontwikkelings Maatschappij (Brabant development society), is very happy with this early phase venture investment that has a pioneering solution for the energy transition,” says Jurgen van Eck, Senior Investment Manager. “The venture will make the best use of the strong machine and manufacturing industry in Brabant for its process development and will support the sustainable energy transition.”

UNIIQ early-stage investment fund

This article was originally published in 2018.
As part of our 10-year track record, we are revisiting key investments from our portfolio.

Update June 2026

When UNIIQ invested in LeydenJar, the company was still working to prove its revolutionary silicon anode technology.

Today, LeydenJar is recognised as one of the leading deeptech companies in the Netherlands and has received the first Peter Wennink Tech Award from FME.

We are proud to have supported the company during its early stages and look forward to following its continued growth.