Corporate funding for energy storage companies, including venture capital, debt and public market financing, totalled $16.7 billion across 120 deals in the first nine months of 2026, a 49 percent increase on $11.2 billion across 85 deals in the same period of 2025, according to Mercom Capital Group’s 9M 2026 report. It was the highest nine month deal count in five years.
Venture capital funding rose 93 percent to $5.4 billion across 79 deals. The largest VC rounds were Base Power at $1 billion, Form Energy at $750 million, Antora Energy at $550 million, and EnerVenue Holdings and Sila Nanotechnologies at $300 million each. Downstream storage companies took the most VC money, about $1.8 billion. Debt and public market financing rose 36 percent to $11.4 billion across 41 deals, split between $6.7 billion of public market financing and $4.7 billion of debt.
Ownership activity rose faster than funding. Corporate M&A increased 35 percent to 27 transactions, and project acquisitions jumped to about 21.6 gigawatts across 108 transactions, from 10.1 gigawatts across 46 deals a year earlier. Standalone storage accounted for about 16.5 gigawatts of the acquired capacity and renewables plus storage for about 5.2 gigawatts.
Mercom chief executive Raj Prabhu attributed the increase to growing electricity demand, grid reliability needs and expanding storage applications, while noting that a few large transactions accounted for much of the funding growth. The composition matters for the beat: capital is accumulating both in alternative battery technologies, including iron air and thermal storage, and in the acquisition market for operating projects.