Aqua Membranes, the developer of a patented 3D printed spacer technology for water filtration, has closed a new round of additional financing to apply its products to the semiconductor market.
The deal was co-led by Micron, a manufacturer of memory and storage solutions, and Clean Energy Ventures, a venture capital firm investing in early-stage climate tech.
“Reducing the amount of energy we use to purify water and improving our ability to efficiently recycle that water after use is one of Micron’s top environmental priorities,” said Andrew Byrnes, director of Venture Capital at Micron. “Aqua Membranes’ high-efficiency filtration solution will play a critical role in our future water sustainability efforts, and we are investing to help ensure their overall success to accelerate expansion into the semiconductor and ultrapure water market.”
“Our technology provides an enormous opportunity to reduce energy requirements for even the highest-grade of purified water and we’re now seeing unprecedented demand from companies looking to proactively and meaningfully invest in their sustainability efforts,” said Craig Beckman, CEO of Aqua Membranes. “The semiconductor industry is a major consumer of purified water, and we look forward to a strong partnership with Micron to improve water sustainability everywhere.”
In addition to providing financing, Micron is also partnering with Aqua Membranes to advance its technology for the semiconductor industry, to improve wastewater recycling and ultimately reduce energy usage in Micron’s UPW (ultrapure water) production processes. The initial partnership aims to improve the effectiveness of Micron’s wastewater recycling while lowering energy use per gallon of recycled water.
