Bramble Energy, an innovator in fuel-cell technology, has announced the opening of its new ‘state of the art’ headquarters in Crawley, West Sussex. The new facility, which is three-times larger than the previous headquarters, includes a world-leading hydrogen innovation and development hub and reflects the company’s rapid growth since launching in 2016.

Founded as a university spin-out, then developed in the garage of co-founder and CEO Dr Tom Mason, Bramble Energy has rapidly gained momentum with its revolutionary fuel-cell technology based on cutting-edge printed circuit board (PCB) technology. The remarkable business growth has led to the demand for a larger facility that can accommodate Bramble Energy's projected expansion and support the scale up of its technology to transform the hydrogen fuel-cell industry.

The facility, called Atrium Court, spans almost 34,000ft² and will house Bramble Energy’s growing workforce, which has increased ten-fold from just eight staff in 2020 to over 80 today. At the heart of Atrium Court lies the Hydrogen Innovation Hub, a world-leading research, development, and testing facility dedicated to hydrogen fuel cells, electrolysers and sensors. The facility can support every element of their technology development and critically, scale it up.

Concepts can be taken through from the R&D phase all the way up to production-ready technology, as well as test fuel cells producing single digit watts up to multi-kW sizes required to service the heaviest of mobility industries.

Major milestone
Dr Tom Mason, Bramble Energy co-founder and CEO, said: “We are extremely proud to move into our new headquarters, which represents a major milestone for Bramble Energy. Our success and growth has been phenomenal in a very short amount of time, which is in no small part to our technology but also the support we have received and having a talented and dedicated team.

Our world-leading Hydrogen Innovation Hub at Atrium Court will significantly contribute to levelling up the UK’s hydrogen and fuel cell testing capability. It will play a crucial role in our future development as we revolutionise the shift towards cleaner and sustainable energy solutions.”

Bramble Energy’s breakthrough innovation in hydrogen fuel-cell technology and design utilising its PCB-X Platform, is solving the key challenges in the production of hydrogen fuel cells and accelerating the hydrogen mobility industry with the world’s first printed circuit board (PCB) hydrogen fuel cell. The patent-protected solution means it can design, manufacture, test, and ship a PCB fuel cell in a matter of weeks, at significantly lower cost than the industry norm.

Financial support has been instrumental in Bramble Energy's growth trajectory. The company successfully secured £5 million in funding in July 2020, raised an additional £35 million in February 2022, and in May 2023, was awarded £12 million in funding from the Advanced Propulsion Centre to provide its fuel-cell technology to a hydrogen bus project.