This spring, Illinois Ventures launched Illini Angels, an angel fund they’ve been working on for a couple years. The fund has more than 50 alumni members already and its first investment was made in Natrion, a student startup that is developing new battery technologies.
Alex Kosyakov, Natrion CEO
“The amount from Illini Angels was a little less than $87K and from Illinois Ventures we’ve received $150K in total,” Natrion CEO Alex Kosyakov told bizblip. “We’ll deploy the funds to finish out commercial pilots and prototype high throughput production processes for our materials to position ourselves for rapid scale-up.”
Natrion, a transportation equipment manufacturing company founded in 2018, is located in Albany, New York. The company has 10 full-time and 8 part-time employees, and has a minimally viable product. In addition to this most recent round, a March 2022 round of $2 million came from Technexus Venture Collaborative, Illinois Ventures, Tamarack Global, Mark Cuban, and other angel investors.
“Our goal is to mobilize the huge and very entrepreneurial alumni base of the university to get engaged with startups that are also part of that ecosystem, whether that’s faculty ventures or student startups,” Tom Parkinson, Senior Director of Illinois Ventures, told bizblip. “We’re hoping for very big things from this startup... It has a big market, a truly different technology with a significant competitive advantage, and is addressing real problems with lithium ion batteries. They’re using a solid material to replace the liquid electrolytes in lithium ion batteries, which can be inserted directly into the existing battery manufacturing process that most of the battery companies follow.”
The launch of Illini Angels is a major milestone for the university’s alumni base, as it provides an opportunity to invest in startups that are part of the Illinois ecosystem. It also represents a new way for the university’s alumni to give back to their alma mater.
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