Energy software company Utilidata announced today it has secured a $60.3 million Series C. The money will be dedicated largely to scaling Karman, a distributed artificial intelligence platform it developed with co-investor Nvidia.
Karman is built on a custom Nvidia module, and can be embedded into devices connected to the grid. The chip uses both on-chip and cloud-based software, as well as distributed AI, to pull data, and is designed to give utilities a clearer, more real-time picture of what’s happening on the grid.
In the past, the pair have focused largely on deploying Karman for residential smart meters, including through a partnership with meter maker Aclara last spring. But now, armed with fresh funding, Utilidata is looking to the opportunity presented by the data center boom.
Like utilities, data centers could also benefit from real-time energy monitoring, in particular because AI workloads can cause sudden spikes in energy use. Running Utilidata’s AI models at the source of data, in this case at the rack level, could operate like smart meters for servers — in theory boosting energy efficiency and reducing waste.
The pivot into the data center market is one that Utilidata is perhaps well-poised to make, given its relationship with Nvidia, the darling of the artificial intelligence boom. Nvidia evolved from niche chipmaker to household name in an astonishingly short period, and has been expanding its own work in the energy sector in recent years.
And Utilidata has itself evolved in recent years. The company’s first product, back in 2012, was a real-time voltage optimization software deployed with a handful of utilities. Utilidata raised both a Series A and initial Series B in quick succession in those early years.
But in 2021, the company began to pivot to artificial intelligence and the grid edge. It raised a second Series B round of $26.7 million, with the backing of Microsoft and Nvidia, to support its new direction and growth.
In that round, Utilidata’s focus was on decarbonization of energy systems, and upgrading the grid. As Mark Kreese, who leads sustainability solutions at Microsoft, wrote in 2022: “Utilidata has developed a unique solution that can help accelerate the path to grid decarbonization and transform the way distribution utilities operate.”
This latest round was led by Renown Capital Partners, a venture firm from Moore Capital Management and the Daily Mail, which launched in late 2023. Other investors include Quanta, and Keyframe Capital. Many of the round’s investors have been with Utilidata since at least its last raise in 2022; these include Renown CIO James McIntyre, who at the time was COO at Moore Strategic Ventures.
