Things You Gotta Know
Helion Signs Letter of Intent for Up to $175 Million CHIPS Award to Advance U.S. High-Voltage Semiconductor R&D for Fusion Energy
Helion announced that it signed a letter of intent with the U.S. Department of Commerce for up to $175 million through the CHIPS Research and Development Office to develop high-voltage semiconductors for its pulsed-power fusion systems, matched by $50 million in private investment for $225 million in total. More than $100 million would fund semiconductor and advanced-packaging R&D in Everett, Washington, with more than 100 jobs, and about $80 million would support tooling and process work with an industry partner in Burlington, Vermont. Commerce would receive a $175 million non-voting interest in Helion based on its most recent Series G valuation upon a definitive award agreement.
Israel’s Energy Ministry Publishes Draft National Fusion Strategy Weighing Up to NIS 2 Billion in Public Investment
Israel’s Ministry of Energy and Infrastructure released its first national fusion strategy for public comment, laying out three investment packages that range from NIS 50 million to 100 million (roughly $13 million to $27 million) over five years to NIS 1 billion to 2 billion (up to about $647 million) over seven to ten years. The middle package, NIS 500 million to 1 billion (up to about $322 million), would build a research center and open national facilities such as the SARAF accelerator at Soreq to private industry, while the largest would add a coordinating authority and a possible experimental reactor built with an international partner. The ministry warns that inaction in the coming years risks missing the window in which global fusion supply chains are forming, and Israeli compact fusion developer nT-Tao said it welcomes the strategy.
Cambridge Heavy Industries Raises $6.2 Million Seed Round to Advance Modular, Benchtop-Scale Fusion System Technology
MIT Nelson Lab spinout Cambridge Heavy Industries announced a $6.2 million seed round led by Azolla Ventures, with participation from Overlay, the Mass Clean Energy Center, the Neta Foundation, the Rothrock family and P3A. The Cambridge, Massachusetts company builds compact fusion machines that use commercial lasers, reports a prototype that reached 350 GPa using tens of millijoules of energy, and plans to start by producing tritium, which it says sells for about $33 million per kilogram. The funding will go toward building its first compact reactor in Massachusetts, buying an ultrafast laser, optics and neutron diagnostics, and expanding the team.
NeoVolta Launches a Third-Party-Ownership Financing Platform to Drive Residential and C&I Energy Storage Revenue Growth
San Diego-based NeoVolta announced an initial $40 million third-party-ownership financing platform for residential storage and solar-plus-storage, backed by a tax equity partner and expected to support about 700 projects. Luminia, NeoVolta’s financing and deployment partner, helps manage the platform, and the California pipeline includes contracted projects for income-qualified homeowners eligible for the state’s Self-Generation Incentive Program rebates. Commercial and industrial offerings are expected to follow as NeoVolta’s Pendergrass, Georgia manufacturing facility ramps, and its NV Wave residential battery will be added starting in November.
Startorus Fusion Magnet Sets Record 63 T/s Field Change Rate in Cryogenic Testing
Shaanxi Startorus Fusion Technology announced that it completed cryogenic testing of the central solenoid model magnet for its planned CTRFR-1 spherical tokamak, reporting a magnetic field change rate of 63 T/s that it describes as a global record for known fusion superconducting magnets. The test also reached a 10 T peak field at 20 K with a cryogenic current of 6,350 A, and next steps include tests above 12 T and AC loss measurements. CTRFR-1 is targeted for 2028, with mass manufacturing of poloidal field model coil magnets in Shanghai slated to begin in 2027 and a pilot plant targeted for 2032.
Stellios Technologies Emerges From Stealth With $5 Million Pre-Seed Round for High-Power Microwave Systems and Compact Fusion
Stellios Technologies emerged from stealth with an oversubscribed $5 million pre-seed round backed by Sofreh Capital, Wave Function Ventures, Cubit Capital, Mana Ventures, Atoms & Bits, Output Capital and Erik Bruckner, and says it held $2 million in signed customer purchase orders before raising outside capital. Its first products are megawatt-class high-power microwave systems for counter-drone and counter-electronics missions, with industrial uses that include plasma heating for fusion research. Founder and CEO Richard Starson, a Caltech PhD who co-founded Escape Dynamics, is also pursuing an aneutronic compact fusion research effort called Stellios Core, which remains a research goal rather than a demonstrated product.
If Man’s Best Friend Is The Dog, The Best Friend of Artificial Intelligence Is Clearly Natural Gas
Natural gas is the largest source of electricity for US data centers today, with recent estimates putting it above 40% of their supply, followed by renewables at about 24%, nuclear at about 20%, and coal at about 15%. By 2030, gas is expected to remain the largest incremental fuel source, and the International Energy Agency projects that roughly 15 to 27 GW of on-site natural gas capacity could be serving data centers globally, mostly in the United States. Behind-the-meter microgrids built around modular gas turbines and reciprocating engines could supply roughly 25 to 33% of incremental data center demand through 2030. Beyond 2035, renewables are poised to provide most of the incremental energy, backed by nuclear, hydro, storage, and flexible gas, with fusion a potential dark horse that is not likely to roll out before 2040.
UK Startup Zenithon Launches Foundational Model for Extreme Physics
UK AI startup Zenithon, which raised $10M last month, is building “world models for extreme physics”: machine-learning systems that act as fast surrogates for computationally expensive physics simulations. The company says its models can evaluate roughly one million design points in the time a conventional simulation takes to evaluate one. Its initial technical focus is fusion energy, building on its founders’ work on machine-learning surrogates for gyrokinetic transport calculations, with spacecraft, rockets, and semiconductor manufacturing also in scope. Zenithon says its models are trained on both simulation data and real-world experimental results and provide uncertainty estimates with predictions. The Fusion Report weighs what that could mean for fusion design cycles, along with the validation and hardware caveats that remain.
