Cambodia-founded startup ATEC has announced raising $15.5 million in a funding round to scale its tech-enabled clean cooking solutions across Asia and Africa.
The round was co-anchored by global investment platform Lightrock and venture investor TRIREC, with participation from Schneider Electric Energy Access Asia Fund.
ATC plans to deploy 200,000 Internet of Things (IoT)-enabled cookstoves over three years in Bangladesh, Cambodia, Malawi, and Nepal, potentially transforming one million lives, per the announcement.
The company said it has already distributed over 25,000 clean cooking appliances across developing nations and partners with organisations, including ENGIE, KliK Foundation, and myclimate.
ATEC’s eCook stoves use IoT sensors to measure energy usage and emission reductions at the household level, creating what the company calls “100% data-auditable” carbon credits.
This contrasts with traditional carbon projects that rely on estimates and projections.
“With this investment, ATEC will show that with the right carbon data backing up every individual credit, carbon projects in the Global South can deliver scale without a compromise on transparency and trust,” said Ben Jeffreys, CEO & co-founder of ATEC.
Globally, one in three people still cook with wood, charcoal, or other polluting fuels, a practice that causes an estimated 3.2 million premature deaths annually, mostly among women and children, according to the World Health Organization.
Traditional cooking methods also generate about 1 gigaton of carbon-dioxide emissions each year, more than the global airline industry, ATEC said.
“Every family deserves a kitchen free from smoke that damages lungs, shortens lives, and keeps people in poverty,” Jeffreys said.
Founded in Cambodia in 2016, ATEC operates in 10 countries across Asia and Africa. The company developed the world’s first pay-as-you-go enabled cookstove in 2018, followed by its IoT-enabled smart stove in 2020.
