- By converting wasted steam pressure in the process into reliable, clean power, the ‘Phoenix’ Expander, developed by the Start-up, establishes a new benchmark for industrial sustainability and efficiency.
CHENNAI, 23rd September 2025: IIT Madras-incubated Deep-Tech Start-up Wankel Energy Systems has raised US$ One Million in a Pre-seed funding round led by Shastra VC, which invests in frontier tech, climate tech, and AI, with participation from strategic angel investors.
With three granted US and Indian patents besides 20+ innovations protected as trade secrets, Wankel is not just building a product but a technology platform.
This funding will help the start-up, which aims to prevent the loss of potential energy in pressure-reducing valves (PRVs), to go global. Over the next decade, it is targeting to deploy more than 1,000 units not only across India but in global markets too, addressing a global challenge.
Across India, more than 45,000 industrial steam boilers generate over 1.26 billion tonnes of steam annually, forming the backbone of critical sectors such as food, dairy, textiles, paper, chemicals, and pharmaceuticals.
The majority of this steam is routed through Pressure Reducing Valves (PRVs), devices that regulate steam flow but lose the potential energy present in the steam in the process. This lost potential, known as ‘exergy’, often amounts to as much as 160 kW of instantaneous power per valve, amounting to nearly ₹66,000 Crore in a year.
Wankel Energy’s ‘Phoenix Expander’ rotary device addresses this inefficiency by capturing the exergy otherwise wasted by PRVs and converting it into clean electricity, without requiring any modification to existing plant infrastructure.
Each Phoenix (steam expander) unit typically achieves payback within 6–24 months, thereafter delivering recurring annual savings of up to ₹50 lakh per valve. Beyond financial benefits, each installation reduces over 180 tonnes of CO₂ emissions per year, making it one of the most impactful climate technologies available per square metre deployed.
Elaborating on the technology, Prof. Satyanarayanan Seshadri, Co-Founder and Advisor, Wankel Energy Systems and faculty Head, The Energy Consortium, IIT Madras, said, “Steam is indispensable to these industries, yet its potential remains significantly underutilised. By converting wasted steam pressure into reliable, clean power, the Phoenix Expander establishes a new benchmark for industrial sustainability and efficiency.”
Supported by the Department of Science and Technology (DST), Government of India, Wankel’s story began as a campus idea, nurtured by grants and government backing, before growing into an innovation platform.
Expressing confidence in this technology, Mr. Ashis Nayak, Founding Partner at Shastra VC said, “Wankel Energy Systems is one of the most technically rigorous and impact-aligned deep-tech startups we have seen. They have brought fundamental and advanced engineering to solve real-world inefficiencies with a clean, scalable business model.”
Further, Mr. Balachandran Raju, Co-founder, Wankel Energy Systems, said, “Our immediate goal is to deploy 6+ Phoenix Expanders across diverse industrial sectors and evaluate their performance in real-world conditions in the coming months. Since every sector operates uniquely, these deployments will help us generate case studies and customer insights to build confidence for expansion. In the first year, we intend to focus on Tamil Nadu, ensuring close proximity support, before scaling to other regions.”
The Start-up’s vision extends beyond steam, into refrigerants, ammonia, hydrogen, and air systems, ensuring that industries across sectors can harness wasted potential. Alongside, the start-up intends to launch its next-generation compact compressors, capable of working across multiple mediums, positioning Wankel as a platform company powering the future of high-efficiency energy systems worldwide.
RECOGNITIONS AND NEXT STEPS
Over two grant cycles, the team of three research scholars and a professor built three generations of their expander platform, going through more than ten design iterations. Each step made the machine sharper, more reliable, and manufacturable at scale, until it became the Phoenix Expander, now the world’s most efficient steam expander.
Wankel was also the Finalist in the MIT Climate & Energy Prize: Wankel Energy Systems became the first and only Indian startup to reach the finals in the prestigious competition's history. Out of over 200 global deep-tech energy startups participating annually, only eight are selected as finalists worldwide.
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