Hong Kong tycoon-backed start-up bets on new battery to challenge energy-storage giants

Hong Kong tycoon Peter Lee Ka-kit's family office, Full Vision Capital, has backed a California-based start-up called EnerVenue in its quest to disrupt the energy-storage industry. The company has begun manufacturing a novel nickel-hydrogen battery at a facility in Changzhou, China, aiming to compete with existing technologies dominated by mainland Chinese players.

CEO Henning Rath stated that EnerVenue's batteries can operate safely and sustainably in harsh environments, with no risk of fire from thermal runaway, setting them apart from other battery types. The company's nickel-hydrogen technology, used in aerospace applications, boasts a design lifespan of 30 years and can undergo 30,000 full charge-discharge cycles, far surpassing the average lifespan of 10 to 15 years and 6,000 cycles for lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries.

EnerVenue expects to boost production capacity to one gigawatt-hour (GWh) by 2027 and to multi-GWh scale by 2028, securing orders from various clients, including a project with 26 energy prism containers totaling 11 MWh for an oilfield in northern China. With Time magazine recognizing EnerVenue as one of the top 10 US green technology companies in 2025, the company's potential applications include solar photovoltaic projects, wind farms, EV-charging infrastructure, and power grids.

As China dominates the global energy-storage system (ESS) battery market, with more than 80% of the market controlled by mainland companies, EnerVenue plans to expand its production lines to other regions, such as the Middle East and the US.