General Motors is backing a sodium-ion battery push aimed at making electricity storage cheaper for utilities and data centers.

Peak Energy, a sodium-ion battery startup backed by General Motors through its investment arm GM Ventures, announced on October 23 that it had raised $108 million in an oversubscribed Series B funding round.

GM Ventures led the round, with participation from LG Technology Ventures and other investors, to support the company’s expansion into grid and data center energy storage.

The startup plans to expand manufacturing, fulfill more than $1 billion in existing customer orders, and bring its passively cooled battery storage systems to the data center market. Its platform eliminates active cooling equipment, which the company says can reduce storage costs and energy waste.

The funding builds on a partnership announced June 10. GM will develop next-generation sodium-ion cells at its Michigan battery laboratories and retain exclusive manufacturing rights, while Peak Energy will integrate the cells into its stationary storage systems.

The partnership focuses on grid storage rather than electric vehicles. Stationary batteries have different requirements from vehicle batteries, making cost, reliability, and safety more important than packing maximum energy into a small, lightweight package.

Lithium-iron phosphate, or LFP, batteries currently dominate stationary storage. Peak Energy is pursuing sodium-ion as an alternative that uses more abundant, potentially lower-cost materials.

GM’s vice president of battery and sustainability, Kurt Kelty, said the chemistry suits the application.

“At GM, we know that the application should determine the battery, and for grid-scale stationary storage, sodium-ion is the right solution,” Kelty said.

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