A 12 months in the past, Redwood Supplies didn’t have an power storage enterprise. Now, it’s the fastest-growing unit inside the battery recycling and supplies startup — a mirrored image of an AI knowledge heart constructing increase.
The proof of that progress, the corporate says, might be discovered at its R&D lab in San Francisco, which has expanded four-fold right into a 55,000-square-foot facility and now employs practically 100 folks. These are small figures in comparison with Redwood’s complete workforce of 1,200 folks and its sprawling campus at its Carson Metropolis, Nevada headquarters and one other facility close to Reno. However its worth and up to date growth are tied on to its burgeoning power storage that launched in June 2025.
The San Francisco facility, which opened in April 2025, is the place engineers combine the {hardware}, software program, and energy electronics for power storage programs that energy knowledge facilities, AI computing, and different large-scale industrial purposes.
The corporate said in a blog post Thursday the growth will help a wave of power storage deployments associated to knowledge facilities. The corporate’s current $425 million Collection E increase will present the capital wanted to scale the enterprise. Google, a brand new investor, in addition to present backer Nvidia, joined the spherical to help Redwood’s power storage enterprise enterprise.
“AI knowledge facilities have undoubtedly been a urgent space of focus,” Claire McConnell, vice chairman of enterprise improvement instructed TechCrunch in a current interview, who added there are different use instances for its programs together with supporting renewable tasks like photo voltaic and wind.
Knowledge facilities have been round for many years, however developments in AI have spurred a constructing spree and a necessity for dependable electrical energy.
“What knowledge heart builders are seeing is one thing that they hadn’t skilled earlier than,” McConnell stated. “After they’re making an attempt to connect with the grid, they’re being instructed it’ll take five-plus years to get that and on the similar time, you’re seeing this huge demand to construct extra knowledge facilities and compete within the AI race.”
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Redwood Supplies was based in 2017 by former Tesla CTO JB Straubel to create a round provide chain for batteries. It initially targeted on recycling scrap from battery manufacturing and shopper electronics, which was processed after which offered to prospects similar to Panasonic. The corporate additionally expanded into the battery supplies enterprise and as we speak produces cathodes for battery cells.
The corporate opened Redwood Vitality final summer season to leverage the hundreds of EV batteries it has collected as a part of its battery-recycling enterprise to supply energy to corporations. Redwood Vitality’s first buyer is Crusoe, a startup that, in 2021, Straubel invested in. Redwood arrange an power storage system that makes use of outdated EV batteries that aren’t but prepared for recycling. The system, which generates 12 MW of energy and has 63 MWh of capability, sends energy to a modular knowledge heart constructed by Crusoe, an organization finest recognized for its large-scale knowledge heart campus in Abilene, Texas — the preliminary website of the Stargate undertaking.
McConnell stated prospects which can be within the pipeline embrace hyperscalers — corporations that function huge cloud computing knowledge facilities and eat a whole lot of megawatts of energy — that may far exceed the capability of its undertaking with Crusoe.
“We’re engaged on ones within the a whole lot of megawatt hours, and we now have ones within the pipeline which can be a number of gigawatt hours,” she stated.
