# Hephaestus Technologies closes $17.2 million round led by CiRi Ventures for fusion magnets > Hephaestus Technologies raised $17.2 million led by CiRi Ventures to manufacture rare-earth-free HTS superconductors and build a net gain reactor by 2030. - Published: 2026-10-21T20:32:29+00:00 - Section: Funding - Author: News Desk - URL: https://newsforagent.com/news/2026-10-21/hephaestus-technologies-17-million-funding - Source: [Startup Researcher](https://www.startupresearcher.com/news/hephaestus-raises-us-17-2-million-to-scale-rare-earth-free-hts-superconductors) ## Key takeaways - Hephaestus Technologies raised $17.2 million in a round led by CiRi Ventures, bringing total funding to US$17.2 million. - The company plans HTS magnet manufacturing in New Jersey from 2027 and a net gain demonstration reactor by 2030. - Hephaestus completed Anvil 0 in 2024, which it describes as the world's first tokamak designed for negative triangularity from inception. [Hephaestus Technologies](https://akta.pro/company-profiles/0002n4v/hephaestus-technologies), a London-based fusion energy company founded in 2019, closed a $17.2 million round led by CiRi Ventures, bringing its total raised to US$17.2 million. The company said the funding will support manufacturing and a net gain demonstration reactor planned for 2030. [Startup Researcher](https://www.startupresearcher.com/news/hephaestus-raises-us-17-2-million-to-scale-rare-earth-free-hts-superconductors) reported the round. ## Hephaestus Technologies' Rare-Earth-Free Magnet Plans The company emerged from stealth with a dual strategy to reduce the largest cost drivers in fusion power: high-temperature superconducting magnets and major plasma instabilities. Hephaestus applied an AI plasma solver to evaluate the full tokamak design space without legacy constraints, a process that identified negative triangularity, which inverts the D-shaped plasma used in most tokamaks, as the most likely configuration for low-cost fusion energy. The latest round was led by CiRi Ventures. Existing investors include Prescience Ventures, [Teampact](https://akta.pro/company-profiles/0004um2/teampact-ventures) Ventures, [Climate Capital](https://akta.pro/company-profiles/0003lhp/climate-capital), Unruly Capital, and CiRi Ventures. The new capital will help Hephaestus move toward two critical milestones: HTS magnet manufacturing in New Jersey from 2027 and a net gain demonstration reactor by 2030. Results from facilities worldwide, including DIII-D, JET, and SMART, have demonstrated that negative triangularity can deliver strong performance without edge localized modes, or ELMs. ELMs are major plasma instabilities that increase cost and complexity in conventional reactor designs. By avoiding them, the company believes its approach can simplify reactor engineering and reduce overall system cost. In February 2021, Antoine Pochelon joined as co-founder and Head of the Experimental Campaign. Dr. Pochelon spent decades at EPFL and produced many of negative triangularity's foundational experimental results. Hephaestus completed Anvil 0 in 2024, which it describes as the world's first tokamak designed for negative triangularity from inception. Hephaestus has also applied its AI-first approach to fusion's largest capital cost: the high temperature superconducting magnets that confine the plasma. The company used its proprietary MaDi-AI materials discovery platform to identify, manufacture, and characterize multiple novel HTS materials at lab scale. These materials were validated by the UK's National Physical Laboratory and are intended to replace rare-earth barium copper oxide, or REBCO. Today's HTS magnets rely on REBCO, a superconductor that is slow and expensive to scale, and concentrated in regions of geopolitical risk. Hephaestus is developing rare-earth-free HTS materials that are more affordable, more scalable, and less exposed to geostrategic bottlenecks. The company has opened early-access discussions with fusion developers seeking HTS supply and is actively hiring across its New Jersey, London, and Rome sites. ## Hephaestus Technologies' Funding History According to akta.pro [company records](https://akta.pro/company-data), Hephaestus Technologies closed a $1.5 million seed funding round in August 2023 led by Climate Insiders with participation from Teampact Ventures and Unruly Capital. The same records list one funding round on file, a 2023-08 pre-seed of $1.5 million led by Climate Insiders, and a total funding figure of $1.5 million at the Pre Seed stage as of 2023-08-15. | Figure | Detail | | --- | --- | | 2023-08 pre-seed | $1.5 million led by Climate Insiders | | Total funding on record | $1.5 million (Pre Seed, last round 2023-08-15) | | Funding rounds on record | 1 | ## Hephaestus Technologies' 2027 and 2030 Milestones The new funding will accelerate HTS manufacturing at a 70,000 square foot New Jersey facility starting in 2027. By 2030, the company plans to demonstrate the commercial advantages of negative triangularity in a net gain demonstration reactor with Q greater than 1. ## Companies in this story - [Hephaestus Technologies company profile](https://akta.pro/company-profiles/0002n4v/hephaestus-technologies) · website: https://hephtechnologies.com - [Climate Capital company profile](https://akta.pro/company-profiles/0003lhp/climate-capital) · website: http://climatecapital.co - [Teampact ventures company profile](https://akta.pro/company-profiles/0004um2/teampact-ventures) · website: https://www.teampact.ventures --- News for Agent · https://newsforagent.com/llms.txt