Beyond the Limits of Lithium-Ion
Engineered for aviation, automotive, and maritime, where performance and safety can't be traded off.
We are building the world’s highest performance battery to transform transportation across aviation, automotive, and maritime sectors, without sacrificing safety, cycle life, or scalability.
Mission
Technology
Our novel lithium-based chemistry can achieve >500 Wh/kg energy density, >7C continuous discharge rate, and >500 cycles. That’s 100% more energy density and 200% more power density than conventional Li-ion! Notably, it does this without compromising safety or scalability, as it is compatible with existing manufacturing processes.
Safety
Safety is engineered into every cell we build. In the videos, a steel nail is driven straight through a battery cell, a standard industry stress test that simulates a severe internal short circuit. In the top video, our WattUp cell simply keeps functioning: no smoke, no fire, no failure. The bottom video shows a conventional battery undergoing the same test, resulting in the kind of violent thermal runaway that's all too common in today's lithium-ion cells. This side-by-side comparison highlights what sets our novel electrolyte and cell architecture apart.
WattUp Cell
Normal Cell
Our technology is designed for markets with demanding performance requirements, including aviation, automotive, and maritime. It will double the range/flight time and increase payload capacities while ensuring safe operation.
Applications
Team
Aaron Garg
CEO & Co-Founder
Aaron has over a decade of experience across the battery and materials industries. Before co-founding WattUp, he spent three years at Cuberg as a Staff Battery Scientist and Senior Analytical Scientist, developing next-generation lithium-metal cell chemistry for aviation and automotive applications, filing multiple patents, and leading investigations into cell safety and performance. Earlier in his career, he worked as an Advanced Researcher at ExxonMobil, where he patented catalyst technologies and led high-throughput materials testing campaigns.
He holds a BS with Distinction in Chemical Engineering from Stanford University (top 15% of his graduating class) and a PhD in Chemical Engineering from MIT, where his research on core-shell nanoparticle catalysts was published in journals including Nature Materials and Angewandte Chemie. His academic honors include Stanford's Frederick E. Terman Award for Scholastic Achievement in Engineering and MIT's Chemical Engineering Practice School Award for outstanding leadership.
Jack Fawdon
CTO & Co-Founder
Jack has deep expertise in lithium-metal battery materials and electrochemistry. Before co-founding WattUp, he spent three years at Cuberg as a Senior R&D Scientist, leading fast-charging development and material-level degradation studies on lithium metal pouch cells, running root cause analyses on cell-level defects, and mentoring junior team members; he is listed as an inventor on 3 filed patents from that work.
He holds a DPhil in Materials Science from the University of Oxford, where his research focused on the transport and thermodynamic properties of liquid electrolytes and the lithium solid electrolyte interphase (SEI), published in journals including Nature Communications and The Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters. He also holds an MChem with First Class Honours from the University of York, including a year abroad at Nanyang Technological University Singapore.
Partners
WattUp Energy is proudly supported by angel investors, VCs, the Bakar Labs for Energy & Materials, and New Energy New York’s ChargeUp Accelerator.
Contact Us
Please reach out if you are interested in learning more! Our team will get back to you as soon as possible.