Kinewell lands £750,000 pre-seed to cut offshore wind cabling costs with AI
This article covers Kinewell, an energy startup, which has raised £750,000 in a pre-seed funding round from Mercia Ventures via the North East Accelerate Fund. The funding will unlock a further six-figure grant and take Kinewell’s total financing to more than £1m, and is intended to accelerate product development, commercialisation and planned hiring to support offshore wind developers, operators and investors.
Kinewell, an energy startup that builds software to optimise offshore wind farm design, has raised £750,000 in a pre-seed funding round from Mercia Ventures. The investment is the first deal from the new North East Accelerate Fund and will unlock a further six-figure sum in grant funding, taking the company’s total financing to more than £1m. Mercia says the cash will accelerate product development, commercialisation and support a planned hire of ten staff as Kinewell almost doubles in size over the next six months.
Why it matters
Offshore wind is entering a growth phase in the UK and Europe driven by large auctions and government support. A recent UK auction secured a record 8.4 gigawatts of capacity and is expected to mobilise roughly £22bn of investment. Software that trims capital and development timelines can materially change project economics: Kinewell’s tooling is billed as reducing cabling costs by about 20% and cutting overall farm costs by around 6%, while shortening development schedules by months.
For developers, operators and investors, even single-digit percentage reductions in upfront costs can move projects from marginal to bankable. This round signals early-stage investor appetite for digital tools targeting construction and engineering costs in offshore renewables.
Inside the product
Kinewell’s first product, launched in 2015, focused on optimising cable layouts. The company has expanded to cover turbine placement and transmission systems and now offers tools that model interactions across cabling, turbines and transmission infrastructure.
The software uses AI, supercomputing power and advanced algorithms to assess millions of layout and materials permutations and identify optimal configurations in minutes. Kinewell reports typical cabling system savings of 20% and a 6% reduction in overall offshore wind farm costs. The firm also says its tools shorten development timelines by months.
Wallsend-based Kinewell currently employs 12 people and is working on three grant-funded innovation and development projects. Its client list includes major renewable energy companies such as Equinor, SSE Renewables, Parkwind and Eurus Energy; these firms are active developers and operators in offshore wind, so their use of Kinewell’s tooling is a practical validation point rather than a sales-stage claim.
Who are the investors?
Lead investor Mercia Ventures backed the round through the North East Accelerate Fund; this is the fund’s first deployment. The initial equity cheque of £750,000 will be complemented by a further six-figure grant package that brings Kinewell’s raised capital to just over £1m. Mercia says the capital will be used to scale development and commercial activities and to support hiring plans that will expand the team by around ten roles over the next six months.
Chris McCourt, Investor at Mercia Ventures, said:
Kinewell has achieved remarkable success despite limited investment to date. With offshore wind entering a new growth phase, it is well positioned to capitalise on this. This investment will help unleash its potential and secure its position as the leading software of its type for the industry.
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Founder perspective
Andrew Jenkins founded Kinewell while studying for a PhD at Newcastle University and remains founder and CEO. The company’s technical origins sit in academic research and engineering, and its move into commercial software has been incremental since the first product in 2015.
Andrew Jenkins, Founder & CEO at Kinewell, said:
Offshore wind is an ideal way to decarbonise our energy supply and improve energy security. Our goal is to bring down costs and reduce the time it takes to develop new wind farms, which in turn will make wind energy more attractive and help unlock further investment into the industry. Kinewell’s solutions have already helped some of the world’s largest renewable energy producers significantly reduce lead times and save hundreds of millions of pounds.
The funding will be Kinewell’s first external investment, enabling the company to accelerate commercial roll-out and product development while increasing headcount from a base of 12 employees.
The bigger picture
Kinewell’s raise sits at the intersection of two trends: rapid build-out of offshore wind capacity in the UK and Europe and growing investor interest in software that reduces construction and operational costs. Research and Markets valued the global offshore wind market at around $56bn in 2024 and projects growth to nearly $299bn by 2034, a backdrop that helps explain why energy investors are looking harder at engineering and optimisation tools.
Regionally, the North East Accelerate Fund’s decision to back a Wallsend-based company highlights increasing attention to clean energy innovation outside London and the south-east. If Kinewell delivers the promised cost and time savings at scale, it could become a component supplier to the broader offshore wind deployment pipeline across the UK and Europe.
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