There is the apple fallen on Isaac Newton's head. And the tub in which Archimedes bathed. Who knows maybe one day we will study the knob of the boiler Marco Martellacci, young physicist with a penchant for cybernetics. “The winter of 2015 – says his friend Giuseppe Giordano, also from Turin – was particularly harsh. And the problem arose of making the systems work in the most efficient way by identifying the solution capable of heating the rooms at the lowest cost". Marco, taking pen and paper, set to work. The result? An algorithm capable of reducing costs by 30%.
Of course, a long research activity runs from the apple to the law of gravity. Just as from that initial intuition on the banks of the Po to the development of Enerbrain, the company that today qualifies among the international leaders in the field of energy efficiency of real estate solutions, runs a long research activity to develop a Hardware and Software technology in able to optimize consumption for air conditioning, improve comfort and, above all, reduce CO2 emissions.
But the motivations and civil commitment remained the same as then, when Martellacci, now Chief Scientific Officer, managed to convince Giordano, the current CEO at the time in Texas after a master's degree in sustainable design, that what he was looking for in the USA , it could also be done in our parts, so sleepy and distrustful but with an enviable reservoir of talent, moreover politically correct. The two are thus joined by two other brains on the run, namely Filippo Ferraris, architect, and from London the engineer Francesca Freyria. They are the initial nucleus of a handful of eggheads, plus about fifty (over half women, "the most motivated" says Giordano), today the protagonists of an entrepreneurial adventure that has now crossed national borders on the wave of an ambition that has never failed, right from the start when the protagonists of the startup knocked on the door of the Lingotto, the largest building in the city, to test their algorithm, which nonetheless had two qualities: it was cheap and it promised big savings.
It was a first great success, followed by agreements with industries such as Michelin or shopping centers such as Eataly, to then continue in Europe and with the jvs in Dubai, Singapore or Japan. “We immediately looked outside Italy” says Giuseppe Giordano. “We have a presence to consolidate in our country, but it takes 12/18 months to implement our solutions on the market. Meanwhile we have built pilot installations in France, Portugal, England, Austria, Switzerland and the United Arab Emirates. Now we are focused on international expansion”.
But no less important is the agreement with Iren which involves 89 buildings in the municipality of Turin, mainly schools and offices, whose heat generation plants will be upgraded by systems that allow for a reduction of the C02 released into the environment by approximately 1.400 tonnes per year. Like adding another 100 trees to the city's ecosystem.
A system, however easy. Practically, Enerbrain provides companies with an Internet of Things kit, with a sensor that monitors comfort and air quality in buildings. It is plug and play, with a battery life of 4-8 years, designed in particular for non-residential construction (airports, malls, conference centres, schools, hospitals) but which can be applied to any type of building. From the data collected in the cloud it can be verified, for example, the presence of CO2 in the air. After that, once you have the picture of the situation, you can control the systems through another tool that can be installed by anyone who connects to any 3G or 4G network and allows you to control the systems remotely and save up to 30% on energy costs. The startup ensures that those who use Enerbrain can save up to 30%-40% of energy costs.
The turnover? From zero to 5 million in the first five years, but in strong acceleration. At the beginning of August Enerbrain closed a new round of financing for 5,2 million with the corporate venture capital fund of the Edf Group, Iren, Equiter, Gellify and Azimut Digitech Fund. A capital injection which, while allowing the founders to keep the majority, will make it possible to raise the necessary capital to implement the 2021-2023 business plan aimed at strengthening its position on the international market, developing new business models and making significant investments in research and development. And it all started with a boiler that consumed too much.
