The most straightforward way to move more electricity is to build a bigger wire. It is also the most expensive, slow, and politically fraught. AssetCool, a Leeds-based company that has spent the last nine years quietly developing a robotic coating system for overhead power lines, is betting the grid can be upgraded with a paint job instead.
Its proposition is a blend of deep-tech materials science and practical field robotics. The company has engineered a proprietary thermal-management coating that, when applied to existing aluminum conductors, helps them shed heat more efficiently. A cooler wire can carry more current before hitting its thermal limit. AssetCool claims this can increase the capacity of an existing line by up to 30 percent [Latitudemedia.com, Unknown]. The second, equally critical part of the equation is the robot that applies it. The company’s modular 'Capacity-1' system is designed to crawl along live power lines, applying the coating in the field without taking the line out of service. This, the company says, can cut the cost of such an upgrade by up to 95 percent compared to traditional reconductoring methods [British Business Bank, Unknown].
A bet on the existing grid
AssetCool’s entire thesis is anchored on the physical and economic reality of the transmission grid. Building new high-voltage corridors is a decade-long saga of permitting, land rights, and capital expenditure. Meanwhile, renewable generation is coming online faster than the wires can handle, creating bottlenecks. The company’s wedge is to treat the existing, aging network of overhead lines as an asset to be retrofitted, not replaced. Its coatings address a suite of line degradation issues beyond just capacity: reducing corona noise (a persistent hum and source of energy loss), mitigating corrosion, and even helping prevent ice accretion [Home | AssetCool, Unknown].
For a transmission network operator facing congestion, the math is simple. A coating application is measured in weeks, not years, and costs a fraction of a rebuild. AssetCool provides the full stack: the coating chemistry, the robotic application platforms, and the processing equipment for factory-based coating of new conductor. It successfully piloted its system on a 132kV wind farm tie-line in Canada [Power Line Coating Robots | AssetCool, Unknown]. The primary customers are the entities that own and operate these critical, and often invisible, assets.
Why Energy Impact Partners wrote the check
The confidence in this hardware-heavy, infrastructure-focused bet was underscored in June 2025, when AssetCool closed a £10 million (approximately $12.7 million) Series A round. The round was led by Energy Impact Partners (EIP), a global investor with deep ties to utility and energy infrastructure players, and included Extantia Capital and Taronga Ventures [British Business Bank, Unknown]. Existing investor NPIF - Mercia Equity Finance also participated. An oversubscribed round led by EIP is a significant signal; it suggests due diligence passed not just on the lab specs, but on the practical path to deployment with regulated utilities.
This recent capital appears to be for scaling manufacturing and commercial operations. The company is actively hiring for senior mechanical design and project engineering roles, pointing to a build-out phase [Jobs.energyimpactpartners.com, Unknown]. The funding history shows a steady, staged approach:
2021 Seed | 2.86 | M USD
2025 Series A | 12.7 | M USD
The competitive landscape and the execution cliff
AssetCool is not the only company looking to solve grid congestion with advanced conductors. Its competition falls into two broad camps. First are the companies making entirely new, high-capacity conductors, like TS Conductor, which uses a carbon-fiber core to allow for greater sag tolerance and higher ampacity. Second are firms working on high-temperature superconductors, a more frontier technology. AssetCool’s differentiation is its focus on retrofitting the installed base with a coating, a potentially faster and less disruptive intervention.
The risks here are not about market need, but about execution at scale. Coating thousands of kilometers of high-voltage line, often in remote or challenging terrain, with a robotic system is a formidable operational challenge. The unit economics must hold outside a controlled pilot. Furthermore, gaining approval from conservative, safety-first utilities for a novel material applied to mission-critical infrastructure is a slow, trust-based process. The company’s answer to this is likely embedded in its team, which includes specialists from robotics, power engineering, physics, and chemistry [Home | AssetCool, Unknown], and in the strategic nature of its investor base.
The next twelve months
The fresh Series A capital sets a clear timeline for what comes next. The key milestones to watch will be the announcement of first commercial deployments with named utility customers, the scaling of its robotic fleet, and potentially, geographic expansion beyond its UK base and initial Canadian pilot. The hiring push for engineering talent suggests the focus is on hardening the technology for wider roll-out.
On a back-of-envelope basis, the potential impact is measured in gigawatts. If a single 500-kilometer transmission corridor can be uprated by even 20 percent, that could unlock hundreds of megawatts of capacity,enough to power a small city,without pouring a single foundation for a new tower. The avoided carbon from enabling more renewables to connect, and from not manufacturing and installing entirely new conductor, is where the climate math gets compelling.
For AssetCool to succeed, it doesn’t need to invent a new kind of grid. It needs to become the preferred, trusted contractor for the one we already have, proving that its robots and coatings are more reliable and cost-effective than the incumbent’s default option: the construction crane. The bet from EIP and others is that in the race to decarbonize, the fastest wire is the one that’s already strung up between the poles.
Sources
- [Latitudemedia.com, Unknown] This startup increases power lines’ capacity by cooling them down | https://www.latitudemedia.com/news/this-startup-increases-power-lines-capacity-by-cooling-them-down/
- [British Business Bank, Unknown] AssetCool | https://www.british-business-bank.co.uk/case-studies/assetcool
- [Home | AssetCool, Unknown] Home | AssetCool, https://www.assetcool.com/
- [Power Line Coating Robots | AssetCool, Unknown] Powerline Coating Robots | AssetCool, https://www.assetcool.com/powerline-coating-robots
- [Jobs.energyimpactpartners.com, Unknown] Senior Mechanical Design Engineer at AssetCool | https://jobs.energyimpactpartners.com/companies/assetcool-2/jobs/71337907-senior-mechanical-design-engineer
- [EU-Startups, July 2025] British robotics company AssetCool raises €11.5 million to scale rapid robotic grid upgrade technology globally | https://www.eu-startups.com/2025/07/british-robotics-company-assetcool-raises-e11-5-million-to-scale-rapid-robotic-grid-upgrade-technology-globally/
- [Taronga Group, Unknown] AssetCool raises £10M Series A to scale rapid robotic grid upgrade technology globally | https://tarongagroup.com/news-articles/assetcool-raises-10m-series-a-to-scale-rapid-robotic-grid-upgrade-technology-globally/