Illini Angels announces first investment
Illini Angels – a program of Illinois Ventures, the University of Illinois System’s venture capital arm – today announced its first investment. Members of Illini Angels invested in Natrion, a solid-state EV battery pioneer operating out of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Research Park and Binghamton, New York.
“We are glad to have Illini Angels join this funding round,” Natrion CEO and co-founder Alex Kosyakov said. “We are very proud to be part of the University of Illinois startup ecosystem, and the launch of Illini Angels over the past year has been a huge boost for early stage companies.”
Natrion develops components for automotive and battery manufacturers that can be rapidly utilized to deploy safe, high-performance all-solid-state rechargeable batteries. These batteries eliminate liquid-state components to improve electric vehicle fire safety, driving range, charge time, and overall lifespan.
“Natrion is an exceptionally promising company and Alex is a very impressive founder,” Illinois Ventures Senior Director Tom Parkinson said. “It was one of the first companies that presented to our angel network and our members were impressed by Alex and his company as well as by their breakthrough technology.”
Illini Angels invested in the second tranche of Natrion’s $3+ million seed funding round, which included investment from Illinois Ventures, TechNexus Venture Collaborative, Tamarack Global, Mark Cuban and other private investors.
"We saw a great deal of promise in Natrion," said Manas Gosavi, an Illini Angels founding member and venture capital investor with Mubadala Capital. "Solid-state battery technology will be a critical enabler of the energy transition, and Natrion provides a compelling solution in the space, strong early traction with marquee customers and a commercially oriented leadership team with a bold vision for the company's growth."
Illinois Ventures founded Illini Angels to support early-stage companies that have founders or leadership who are connected to the University of Illinois including faculty, students, and alumni from any of the three universities in the system, as well as companies that license university technology. Illini Angels members span all three universities.
In addition to early-stage funding, Illini Angels provides advice, mentorship and access to one of the most powerful and entrepreneurial alumni networks in the world.