Digital twin startup Neara secures $60M to help utilities manage aging grids and rising AI-driven energy demand using physics-based infrastructure modeling.
Neara, a developer of physics-based digital twins for critical infrastructure, announced Monday that it has raised $60 million in a Series D funding round aimed at helping utilities modernize aging power grids and meet surging global energy demand.
The round was led by TCV, a prominent growth equity firm whose past investments include Netflix, Spotify, Revolut and Nubank. Returning investors Partners Group, EQT, Square Peg Capital and Skip Capital also participated, bringing Neara’s total funding to roughly $127 million.
The fresh capital comes at a pivotal moment for global infrastructure. Power networks designed decades ago are struggling to keep pace with electrification, renewable energy adoption and the rapid expansion of artificial intelligence and data centers—all of which are sharply increasing electricity consumption.
Also Read: Part 2: The High-Stakes Reality of AI’s Second Act
A Technology Built for an Overstretched Grid
Neara’s platform creates detailed digital replicas of real-world infrastructure, allowing utilities to simulate how networks behave under various conditions. By grounding every analysis in real-world physics, the company says it can help operators identify unused capacity, accelerate grid upgrades and improve resilience without costly trial-and-error projects.
“Power grids all over the world are reaching their limits,” said Jack Curtis, Neara’s co-founder and chief commercial officer. “Systems built for a different era are now being pushed beyond their design assumptions. The world needs faster, more intelligent ways to understand what infrastructure is truly capable of.”
Global electricity consumption for data centers alone is projected to more than double by 2030, according to industry forecasts, underscoring the urgency of improving access to existing grid capacity. Neara argues that its technology can help bridge that gap by enabling faster connections for new renewable generation and large energy users.
Growing Global Footprint
Neara has already established partnerships with major utilities worldwide. In the United States, customers include Southern California Edison and CenterPoint Energy. In Europe, the company works with ESB Networks in Ireland, Scottish Power in the United Kingdom and Hedno in Greece. In Australia, Neara says it serves nearly 90 percent of network utilities.
The company says its platform has modeled more than 15 million infrastructure assets across four continents, covering over 2 million miles of networks. Utilities using the system have brought new infrastructure online 85 percent faster and achieved substantial cost savings by consolidating planning, design and maintenance workflows.
Also Read: CES 2026: Qualcomm Expands Edge AI Push With New IoT Chips and Tools
Backing From Global Investors
“This is TCV’s third investment in an Australian-founded, category-defining technology,” said Muz Ashraf, a general partner at TCV. “The infrastructure challenges facing the world—from climate resilience to energy access for AI compute—require fundamentally new approaches. Neara’s highly differentiated platform is a leap forward in how utilities manage their grids.”
Neara plans to use the new funding to expand its global engineering teams and accelerate development of machine-learning and AI capabilities, while also growing its commercial presence in key international markets.
A New Layer of Infrastructure Intelligence
As electricity networks approach their physical limits, traditional planning tools are proving inadequate, Neara argues. The company positions its physics-enabled digital twins as a foundational technology for making more accurate, data-driven decisions about critical infrastructure.
With this latest investment, Neara aims to establish itself as the standard platform for understanding, upgrading and operating the world’s most essential systems—at a time when reliable energy has never been more important.
