Perovskia Solar's EIC Accelerator Printed Perovskite Cells for IoT

Internet of Things and other electronic devices are mostly powered by batteries that have to be recharged or replaced and end up as waste, the E-SEED project summary in CORDIS says. Perovskia Solar AG, a spin-off of the Swiss materials research institute Empa, prints perovskite solar cells to the size, look and electrical output a device maker specifies, so that the device can draw its power from indoor light instead. In June 2026 the company announced that the EIC Accelerator had selected it for blended finance, and on 23 September 2026 the grant agreement for its project E-SEED was signed, according to CORDIS.

CORDIS records an EU contribution of €2,252,874.59 for 24 months, from 1 October 2026 to 30 September 2028, under the call HORIZON-EIC-2026-ACCELERATOR-02. The project is one month old. What follows is what the company has promised, what it had shown before the award, and which of its claims can already be checked.

Solar cells printed to order

The E-SEED summary in CORDIS states the market case plainly: device makers want to cut battery use, and current indoor photovoltaics "still lack custom design flexibility, optimal low-light performance, and ease of integration." Perovskia is not alone in the field. Other European companies sell cells for low-light devices, among them Epishine with printed organic cells, Exeger with its flexible Powerfoyle cell and Dracula Technologies, which powers Internet of Things devices from ambient light. Two of Perovskia's 15 early partners were already using amorphous silicon or organic cells, pv magazine reported.

Perovskia's approach is to print the whole cell stack, contacts included, onto glass, using what CORDIS calls proprietary inkjet-printed perovskite technology, so that each customer can order its own size, appearance and electrical output. CEO Anand Verma told pv magazine in January 2024 that the Aubonne line was "a sheet-to-sheet production line based on commercially available equipment with minor customization." The same report gave the latest cells an open-circuit voltage of 0.9 V and 80 to 85 microwatts per square centimetre at 1,000 lux, with a target of 100 to 120 in a development project with Empa.

The CORDIS objective itself names "the typical degradation of perovskites" as the problem to overcome. pv magazine reported that the cells kept 80% of their efficiency after 5,000 hours of full-sun exposure and 90% after 1,000 hours, and that they comply with the EU restriction on hazardous substances (RoHS). Those are company figures reported by the trade press; no independent test result was found. Neither the company's website nor its June 2026 release gives an efficiency or output figure newer than January 2024.

Customers, counted three ways

The company's customer list is mostly anonymous. pv magazine reported in January 2024 that 15 original equipment manufacturers were evaluating, testing or producing with Perovskia's cells, two of them switching from amorphous silicon or organic cells and the rest from batteries, and named one design-in: a wristband health tracker from the French company Baracoda. A seed-round release of September 2024 spoke of more than ten Internet of Things clients. An undated perovskite-info profile says more than thirty firms.

The website now describes its customers by type rather than name: a US Internet of Things sensor company, a Fortune 100 industrial electronics firm, a top-five Indian carmaker and a top-three global automotive supplier. A September 2026 report by the Greater Geneva Bern area (GGBA) agency, published on now.solar, says the company is shipping custom cells for a tracking device to a US customer, runs proof-of-concept projects in Europe and Asia, and has launched the Sun-a-Wear UV tracker, which it presents as the first commercially available product powered by perovskite photovoltaics. That claim is the company's; no independent check of it was found. The June 2026 release says Perovskia has "recurring revenue contracts" with device makers in Europe, North America and Asia, without naming them or giving revenue.

Seed money, a debt conversion and an EU grant

The Swiss Official Gazette of Commerce, read through Zefix, shows Perovskia Solar AG founded with CHF 100,000 of share capital, half paid in. On 19 June 2024 the shareholders approved an ordinary capital increase paid by converting CHF 2,102,624.01 of claims into 435,701 ordinary shares and 3,297,086 shares with preference on dividends and liquidation proceeds, raising capital to CHF 137,327.87, and introduced conditional capital. The same entry, published on 4 October 2024, records Tobias Meyer as the new board chair, Anand Verma as vice-chair and investor Nils Hagander joining the board. The company announced a $2.4 million seed round on 18 September 2024; the register does not say whether the converted claims are the same money.

In 2025 Innosuisse, the Swiss innovation agency, awarded CHF 1.05 million to automate the back end of the production line, according to perovskite-info and a funding note on Techleap. No source found confirms that the automated line is running.

The EIC award came in two parts. The grant is the one CORDIS records. The equity is not settled: the company's release says the EIC Fund "signalled its intent" to co-invest in its next financing round, potentially matching up to 50% of it, subject to due diligence. The EIC Fund's beneficiaries page did not name Perovskia when checked, and the September 2026 report says the company still plans to close its current funding round. Reported grant sizes also differ slightly: one report on two Empa spin-offs in the round gives €2.2 million each, while the company and CORDIS give €2.25 million.

What E-SEED promises

The CORDIS objective sets out five aims: design freedom through digitally printed cells, high efficiency indoors and outdoors, robustness that overcomes the usual degradation of perovskites, production costs low enough for mass scale, and no toxic or rare raw materials. The company's release adds higher conversion efficiency, faster automated throughput, longer lifetime and more patents. With the project in its first month, none of these can be scored yet; the scorecard below lists what can already be checked.

1. Digitally printed custom cellsShown before the awardPrinted stack on glass in customer-specified shapes, per pv magazine; Sun-a-Wear and Baracoda design-ins.
2. Higher indoor efficiencyNot yet measurableLast public figure 80 to 85 µW/cm² at 1,000 lux (January 2024); target 100 to 120.
3. Robustness against degradationCompany data only80% after 5,000 hours of full sun as reported by the trade press; no independent test found.
4. Automated volume productionIn progressInnosuisse-funded automation; mass manufacturing announced, output not published.
5. EIC Fund equityPendingIntent to co-invest, subject to due diligence; no investment announced.

The September 2026 report also describes a side project: at the Bengaluru Space Expo 2026 the company signed a memorandum of understanding with India's AkashaLabdhi to supply cells for evaluation and qualification, with a flexible prototype planned for the end of 2026 and a goal of sending cells to space by the fourth quarter of 2027. A memorandum is not a supply contract, and these dates are the company's targets.

A Swiss grant and an EU battery rule

As a Swiss company, Perovskia is funded directly by the European Commission because Switzerland has returned to Horizon Europe. The EU Programmes Agreement was signed on 10 November 2025 and associates Switzerland retroactively from 1 January 2025, so projects from the 2025 programme year onward are paid from Brussels, according to Euresearch, the Swiss Horizon Europe information network.

The project's own case rests on regulation as much as on technology: the CORDIS summary says device makers are looking to extend autonomy and "comply with regulation pressures to reduce disposable battery usage." Article 11 of the EU Batteries Regulation requires portable batteries to be removable and replaceable by the end user from 18 February 2027, with listed exceptions, as the Commission's guidelines and TÜV SÜD set out. Whether that pushes manufacturers toward harvesting light rather than redesigning battery doors is not something any source found has measured. CORDIS tags E-SEED fully to its climate tracker.

Two Perovskia companies in the register

The Swiss register holds a second, older company in Aubonne, PEROVSKIA SA (CHE-113.503.908), which was called Novacis SA until November 2020 and whose general meeting resolved on 10 November 2022 to dissolve it; it has been listed as in liquidation since. It is a separate legal entity and not the EIC beneficiary: CORDIS names Perovskia Solar AG, with the VAT number of CHE-231.549.406, as the sole coordinator, and the cantonal register extract lists Perovskia Solar AG as an active company.

The reporting is based on publicly available sources, listed below.