The North American startup Yotta Energy, which developed a scalable and decentralized solar energy storage solution, was the big winner of the second global edition of Starter Business Acceleration. This startup acceleration program created and promoted by EDP, in partnership with the companies Verbund and TurningTables (Grupo Cuerva) and managed by the innovation consultant Beta-i, aims to promote collaboration and support startups and small and medium-sized companies (SMEs) from around the world in creating relevant solutions for the energy industry. The final stage took place in a virtual ceremony, where the North American startup was awarded a prize of 50 thousand euros to invest in its business.

EDP, through EDP Ventures, recently announced the investment in Yotta Energy, in which they are already working on a pilot project to test their innovative solution in the group's business. In addition to the winning startup, EDP already has 10 other pilot projects confirmed and another 22 to be evaluated with startups participating in this edition of the Starter Business Acceleration, which will bring new solutions to the various business areas of the company, in different geographies.

The program started in February with a 64% increase in the number of applications compared to the previous year. Of the 820 startups from 74 countries that applied for the second edition, 30 were chosen to participate in three virtual modules lasting three days - in Latin America (Brazil), North America (Houston) and Europe (Vienna) - and working together with partner companies to develop pilot projects that would solve their business challenges.

Due to the security measures applied in almost all the world following the pandemic that is lived in the world, the program opted for a 100% virtual format. For this, a digital platform was developed capable of simulating a real and physical environment, with startups and utilities having their own space. Despite the challenges, the adaptation was successful.

“Another edition of Starter that exceeds all expectations and confirms the global positioning of the program. Starter is a reference program that promotes open innovation projects between EDP and the best worldwide early stage startups in the energy sector.  The adaptation to a virtual format boosted the involvement of more than 100 employees of the EDP group, an unprecedented number, in the different geographies where we are present. This edition of Starter also confirmed that it is possible to innovate literally from 'home', with startups from all over the world, with different time zones, establishing relationships of trust, albeit at a distance, eye to eye across the screen. We just need to be ambitious, passionate about innovation and technology and, above all, very professional and demanding”highlights Carla Pimenta, director of Startup Engagement at EDP.

In line with EDP's strategic areas, the candidate startups presented projects in the following categories: Clean Energy, Customer Focused Solutions, Digital Innovation, Energy Storage, Intelligent Grids and Innovation Internal Processes. The nine finalist startups will have the opportunity to participate in this year's Web Summit.

The finalist startups were as follows:

• Aerones (Latvia) - Innovative robotic technology that provides more efficient, faster and safer Operation and Maintenance services in wind farms.

• EET - Efficient Energy Technology (Austria) - EET hardware, SolMate, is a photovoltaic plug-in with storage for any home, which can detect the energy consumption of the home through a wall outlet, without any additional hardware.

• YData (Spain) - intends to support a world led by data, allowing organizations to guarantee the privacy of its users and comply with data protection standards.

• Aplanet (Spain) - empowers organizations with cloud-based solutions, which allows them to manage, measure and report their social and environmental impact.

• Climacell (USA) - provides the best operational and Meteorological Information tools, allowing better business decisions and efficient operations for energy companies.

• Yotta Energy (USA) - is an energy storage company with a simple, modular, economical, safe and durable battery that can be associated with solar panels.

• Energy Source (Brazil) - works with solutions to reduce, reuse and recycle Lithium Batteries.

• Nuveo Technologies (Brazil) - is able to automate manual processes, as well as to interpret contracts, or any documents or images through artificial intelligence, making its customers less dependent on back-office manual work.

• Green Platform (Brazil) - has a platform that controls all KPI's related to the environment, from the point of view of generation and distribution. They are also able to control the materials discarded during the maintenance of the distribution lines.

Learn more about the program at http://theenergystarter.com