Titan Advanced Energy Solutions, a pioneer in ultrasound-based battery management solutions, announced a $33-million Series B financing led by HG Ventures, the corporate investment arm of The Heritage Group. This new capital positions the company to accelerate industrial-scale deployments of its battery diagnostics and battery sensing/management technologies to drive safer and more efficient manufacturing, operation and repurposing of lithium-ion batteries.

Additional investors from the US, Europe, Asia and the Middle East included H+ Partners, GS Futures, the investment arm of the GS Group, GS Energy, Doral Energy-Tech Ventures, the investment arm of Doral Group and Fortistar, along with existing investors Energy Innovation Capital and SE Ventures, the investment arm of Schneider Electric.

Our ultrasound-based technology spans the battery life cycle. From manufacturing and first use to second life and recycling. We will continue to propel the shift toward electrification by solving critical issues impacting the performance and safety of new and reused lithium-ion batteries.

—Shawn Murphy, CEO and co-founder of Titan

Traditional battery management systems (BMS) use a combination of voltage (V), current (I), and temperature (T) inputs to determine how to safely operate Li-ion batteries and output state-of-charge (SoC) and state-of-health (SoH). However, incumbent BMS technology doesn’t actually measure SoC and SoH—it estimates them.

Various efforts have been devised to avoid or resolve this fundamental problem, but none have been effective because they continue to rely on estimations, all with the same V, I, and T combination, Titan says.

In contrast, Titan measures two critical parameters—State-of-Health (SoH) and State-of-Charge (SoC), both of which dictate how a BMS for a battery-operated vehicle or device operates—with high accuracy and precision.

Using ultrasound, Titan gets 2D real-time diagnostics of batteries at the molecular level, which translates into very high accuracy and high precision SoC/SoH measurements. As an added bonus, it also achieves unprecedented safety through an early warning/detection system made possible by the very nature of ultrasound.

• State-of-charge. Sound travels through different mediums at a different velocity. This works very well for determining the SoC of a battery. A fully charged battery is stiffer, the Lithium ions are in the anode and the speed of sound is faster than when the battery is less charged. Through ultrasound, Titan can measure SoC with 99% accuracy and precision at all stages of the battery’s life, regardless of the current applied, since the SoC corresponds to the volume of Li-ions physically present in the anode.

• State-of-Health. Ultrasound is highly effective at detection/evaluation, dimensional measurements, material characterization, and revealing changes in materials—exactly what happens as a battery ages. Several chemical processes influence the physical properties of a battery, and therefore its capacity, over time. One of the dominant degradation mechanisms is the growth of the secondary solid electrolyte interface (SSEI), a plaque (long organic polymer chain) which prevents the normal flow of Li-ions from the anode to the cathode.

To date, the Titan system has been proven to deliver real-time SoC/SoH accuracy at 99% for NMC, LMO, and LFP batteries.

Titan’s primary focus is on the automotive and stationary storage markets. The global EV batteries market is expected to grow from $19.78 billion in 2020 to $38.32 billion in 2025, and the global battery energy storage system market is projected to grow from $2.9 billion in 2020 to $12.1 billion by 2025.