Latest news from Loughborough University
10 Jul 2015
Success for Loughborough graduate company Pavegen
Founder of Pavegen, Laurence Kemball-Cook
Loughborough University graduate company Pavegen has smashed its crowdfunding venture by raising nearly £2m from online investors.
The clean-tech start up that generates electricity from footfall launched a six week campaign in the heart of the Canary Wharf district. Commuters and members of the public saw how a 10 tile installation could power two streetlights.
Pavegen, which was created by Loughborough University Design School graduate Laurence Kemball–Cook, reached their £750,000 target in just 59 hours of launching their crowdfunding venture and went on to raise £1.92m from 1500 online investors.
This investment will bring Pavegen a step closer towards commercialisation of the technology, enabling mass production and reducing the cost of the tiles to equate to standard flooring.
As well as their crowdfunding success, the graduate company has announced that Jeff Martin, an ex-Apple executive and current CEO and Founder of Tribal Planet Inc, will join the Pavegen advisory board.
Jeff will be involved in building out the technology, ensuring Pavegen is one of the core components within smart cities of the future and other digital infrastructure. He will also be working alongside Pavegen in future key markets, including the Middle East and across the USA.
To find out more about Pavegen, please click here.
Notes for editors
Article reference number: July News
Loughborough is one of the country’s leading universities, with an international reputation for research that matters, excellence in teaching, strong links with industry, and unrivalled achievement in sport and its underpinning academic disciplines.
It has been awarded five stars in the independent QS Stars university rating scheme, putting it among the best universities in the world, and was named University of the Year in the What Uni Student Choice Awards 2015. Loughborough is consistently ranked in the top twenty of UK universities in the Times Higher Education’s ‘table of tables’ and is in the top 10 in England for research intensity. It was 2nd in the 2015 THE Student Experience Survey and was named Sports University of the Year 2013-14 by The Times and Sunday Times. In recognition of its contribution to the sector, Loughborough has been awarded seven Queen's Anniversary Prizes.
In 2015 the University will open an additional academic campus in London’s new innovation quarter. Loughborough University London, based on the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, will offer postgraduate and executive-level education, as well as research and enterprise opportunities.