Nuclear power startup Newcleo is moving its holding company from the UK to France, as the company looks to tap EU funding pools in its bid to raise a €1bn equity round.
Newcleo said in its annual accounts, released yesterday, that it had announced to shareholders and employees in January that it was making the move to increase the potential of attracting “significant funding from EU financial institutions”.
“While we are moving the location of our holding company, our plans for the UK are unchanged and we remain committed to investing and building next-generation SMRs to generate electricity for the UK grid and industry,” a Newcleo spokesperson told Sifted. Sifted understands that the move would not involve employees relocating.
Raising €1bn
Newcleo is developing lead-cooled small modular reactors (SMRs) fuelled with radioactive waste — one of six types of “fourth-generation” reactors (also known as advanced reactors), which will begin to be rolled out in the 2030s.
The news comes nearly a year and a half after the company announced in March 2023 that it was targeting a €1bn equity round.
Newcleo, which is the best-funded nuclear startup in Europe and currently the only unicorn in the region’s sector, closed €87m of that target earlier this year, bringing the startup’s total funding to €487m, three years on from launch.
But founder and CEO Stefano Buono told Sifted in May that the company would need to raise billions more if it’s to realise its ambitions of building a revenue-making commercial reactor by the early 2030s.
Newcleo is hoping French and EU institutional funding can help it get there. “The rationale for the restructure is partly to improve the potential to attract funding from French and other EU financial institutions in the future,” the company said in its accounts.
French government-funded investment bank Bpifrance has “strict” requirements on holding companies being based in the country, explains Tommy Stadlen, cofounder and partner at Giant Ventures.
Newcleo’s publicly-announced backers include US VC Exor Ventures and the investment vehicle of the Agnelli family office — founder of Italy’s largest carmaker Fiat. Italian investor Azimut Group and Italian tech transfer fund LIFTT are also investors.
The startup said that it expects a further close this year and is “progressing promising discussions with significant prospective investors,” according to its accounts.
The French connection
Newcleo has long been courted by France.
Earlier this year it announced it would increase the size of a planned fuel factory in the south of the country — and shelve plans for one in the UK — after a reported charm offensive from President Emmanuel Macron.
UK general manager Andrew Murdoch told Sifted in March that the UK government had said its waste plutonium would not be available to be turned into fuel for use in advanced modular reactors.
“The creation of a dedicated French holding company reinforces our position to ensure we have a strong connection to an advanced fuel cycle to support our fuel cycle ambitions,” the Newcleo spokesperson said.
The startup also says it will build a demonstrator reactor in France by 2030.
Newcleo also plans to complete a research facility in Italy by 2026, hopes to launch its first revenue-making commercial reactor sometime after 2033 and further down the line deploy a fleet of its power plants across Europe. It currently has operations in the UK, France, Italy, Switzerland and Slovakia.
Newcleo’s average monthly cash burn is €13m for the first half of 2024 and it made a loss of €57.5m in 2023 — up from €18.1m in 2022 — according to its accounts. The company had €221m of cash in the bank on 30 June 2024.
Read the orginal article: https://sifted.eu/articles/nuclear-newcleo-raise-startup-france/
