NEU Battery Materials Closes $7.6 Million Round to Industrialise LFP Recycling

Singapore-based NEU Battery Materials has secured $7.6 million in fresh capital, money it intends to pour into scaling up its lithium iron phosphate (LFP) recycling operation. The round was co-led by French venture fund Shift4Good and SGInnovate, the investment arm backed by the Singaporean government.

The timing is no accident. NEU has just brought a 1,300-tonne-per-year plant in Singapore online, and the new funds are meant to push that facility toward steady output of battery-grade lithium.

From Scrap to Battery-Grade Lithium

The feedstock NEU works with is hardly glamorous: offcuts from cathode manufacturing and the shredded residue — known as black mass — that comes out of packs at the end of their service life. Turning that material into lithium pure enough for new cells is the hard part, and it is where the company has staked its claim.

NEU describes its patented electrochemical redox targeting method as the first of its kind built specifically for LFP chemistry. Electricity and water drive the reaction, aided by regenerable chemicals. Compared with the hydrometallurgical and pyrometallurgical routes that dominate today, the company says its process produces less waste and cuts emissions by as much as 83%.

At a glance: 1,300 t/year plant commissioned in Singapore · $7.6M raised · Up to 83% lower emissions than conventional recycling · Round co-led by Shift4Good and SGInnovate

LFP’s market position explains the interest. According to the International Energy Agency, the chemistry now powers more than 55% of EV batteries and over 90% of stationary energy storage systems globally — a volume that will eventually return as scrap.

Why Investors Are Paying Attention

Beyond the plant ramp-up, NEU plans to spend the money on international expansion, further cost reductions and a wider partner network. The company frames its hardware as modular, which should make it easier to replicate outside Singapore.

Bryan Oh, co-founder and CEO, said the capital “will catalyse the scale-up and deployment” of the technology and allow NEU to keep pushing prices down for customers as volumes grow.

For SGInnovate, the logic is strategic rather than purely financial. Hsien-Hui Tong, Executive Director of Investments, said the fund remains committed to supporting NEU’s growth within the battery value chain.

Shift4Good’s Sebastien Guillaud put it more bluntly, calling LFP recycling both a decarbonisation task and a question of industrial sovereignty. Recovering lithium domestically, he argued, is one route to supply chains that can absorb shocks.

The broader context: as the first big wave of LFP packs nears retirement, recyclers are racing to prove they can do the job economically. NEU’s $7.6 million will not settle that race on its own, but it buys the company time to show its process works at commercial scale — not just in a pilot line.