Breakthrough Energy, the investment fund connected to Bill Gates, has announced its sixth cohort of the Breakthrough Energy Fellows programme, backing 21 early-stage startups developing technologies to transform the global energy sector. The initiative comes as the organisation warns that electricity demand will surge dramatically over the coming decades as countries electrify entire economic sectors to reduce carbon emissions, with demand potentially tripling by mid-century. Whilst AI data centres have captured public attention, Breakthrough Energy views them as merely a harbinger of the vastly larger energy transformation ahead.

The cohort spans ambitious technologies across multiple domains. Fusion companies Borealis Fusion and StarWarden are pursuing advanced reactor designs, whilst semiconductor firms K1 Semiconductor, Bedrock Semiconductor and Vari Flux aim to dramatically improve power electronics efficiency and reduce costs by up to 50%. Other portfolio companies are developing agricultural crop-disease detection systems, ocean-floor mineral harvesting robotics, and hydrogen-ammonia infrastructure to address the absence of existing hydrogen transport capacity in countries like the United States. Eric Toone, managing partner at Breakthrough Energy Ventures, described the strategy as taking "big bets" hoping for "big payoffs," whilst acknowledging that some technologies, particularly proton-boron fusion, represent long-shot gambles with significant potential upsides.