Furbnow, an all-encompassing home energy efficiency platform, is dedicated to simplifying the journey to net-zero for every household. In a significant stride toward this goal, the UK climate-tech startup has secured a £950k pre-seed investment.
This funding, supported by key backers including SFC Capital, Norrsken Accelerator, and Daniel Luhde-Thompson (CTO of Quadrature), aims to launch Furbnow’s groundbreaking home decarbonisation platform into the market.
Greenify old, leaky homes using virtual tech
Furbnow’s mission is underscored by the urgency to retrofit 2 homes per minute to meet the Net Zero targets by 2050. Recognising the gap in support for those seeking changes, Furbnow strives to fill this void. The startup plans to initiate a trial with Birmingham City Council’s Route to Net Zero team in early 2024, focusing on enhancing energy efficiency for households that do not qualify for grant funding.
The upcoming pilot program with Birmingham City Council aligns with the local authority’s commitment to decarbonise homes, aligning with their 2030 Net Zero target.
In the UK, where 97% of homes are currently classified as inefficient, urgent retrofitting is imperative to meet national and global Net Zero objectives, marking a crucial step in addressing the current shortfall.
Birmingham-based Furbnow was founded by Becky Lane (energy efficiency industry expert) and Laurence Watson (serial climate tech entrepreneur and data scientist). With almost 20 years – of experience across energy, buildings and technology, they are on a mission to retrofit one million homes by 2030 by eliminating the hassle from every stage of the home energy improvement process. With customers already undertaking retrofit projects with the help of Furbnow, this latest investment will support the expansion of its supplier network to support customers with insulation, ventilation, new energy generation and low-carbon heating installations in their homes.
“Everyone deserves a warm, comfortable home without costly bills and yet 11.7 million homes sit at the D energy rating or less. Sadly, energy efficiency has been the poor relation to the low-carbon technologies that grab headlines. But if your home is cold and draughty, no amount of Co2 savings is going to be better for you. We’re building Furnow to be the go-to platform for homeowners who want advice and support as they plan and install low carbon technologies and energy efficiency elements in homes,” says Becky Lane, co-founder and CEO of Furbnow.
Furbnow helps homeowners plan their home energy improvement roadmap with a Home Energy Plan and supports the project stage with packages priced to suit every customer. The firm is developing new planning methods to provide robust lower-cost options for the domestic market using building information and energy performance data. It will also be working closely with green finance providers and insurers to provide a full end-to-end service.
Matt Seden, Chief Strategy Officer at Nesta, said: “Homeowners are increasingly interested in making their homes more climate-friendly, especially if they can save on their energy bills at the same time and still stay warm all year. Furbnow simplifies a retrofitting process that can otherwise be surprisingly complex and laborious, with end-to-end expert support, making it easy and convenient for homeowners. From its beginnings as a Mission Studio concept, Furbnow is now an innovative tech start-up in its own right, with the potential to help decarbonise a million homes and accelerate the UK’s path to net zero.”
Jason Druker, Portfolio Manager at SFC Capital added: “Retrofitting is a strong investment theme at the moment, and rightly so given its influence on getting us to Net Zero and its potential impact on the cost of living crisis. Nearly half the emissions that cause climate change come from our offices, shops, schools and more critically from our homes. Furbnow can be an influential solution and is at the forefront of making retrofitting more accessible and affordable for households. We are excited to be working with them and supporting their journey.”
Alex Bakir, GP, Norrsken Accelerator said: “Improving the efficiency of our building stock has been the elephant in the room in climate change discussions for decades. For the first time, Furbnow is bringing a holistic approach to the problem space, with a leadership team that knows the sector inside out, and is deeply committed to fixing it.”
