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Battery Maker Triples Space in Irvine for Push on Lithium-Ion

An Irvine-based startup backed by venture capitalists is tripling its space with a new headquarters at University Research Park as it shifts toward commercialization.

Enevate Corp. makes rechargeable lithium-ion batteries for smartphones, tablets and other devices. It’s moving from offices near the Irvine Spectrum to a 22,000-square-foot space at 101 Theory Drive in University Research Park in January to accommodate new hires and a research and development push.

The company currently leases about 7,000 square feet of space in a deal that’s set to expire later this year.

Enevate employs about 30 people and is looking to grow its work force to about 50 by the end of 2012, according to Jarvis Tou, Enevate’s executive vice president of marketing and business development.

The company is looking to hire manufacturing and quality-control personnel here as it ramps up research and development.

“The technology is moving forward,” Tou said. “We have to continue to commercialize the technology that we’ve developed.”

Enevate is trying to replicate the business model of Irvine-based chipmaker Broadcom Corp., which designs chips in the U.S. and Europe, has them made in Asia, and sells them around the world.

Enevate touts its technology for smaller, thinner batteries for smartphones and tablets as longer-lasting. Batteries with longer life are coveted by cell phone makers and frustrated consumers.

Enevate was founded in 2005 and was known as Carbon Micro Battery Corp. until last year. It’s part of a hotly competitive field aiming to come up with longer-lasting batteries, led by South Korea-based Samsung SDI Co., as well as Sanyo Electric Co. Ltd. and Sony Corp. in Japan.

$6 Million In

Enevate has received more than $6 million in venture funding from San Diego-based Mission Ventures and Draper Fisher Jur-vetson in Menlo Park.

“Going after significantly improved energy density battery solutions for applications in consumer devices and eventually transportation are enormous opportunities,” Raj Atluru, a Draper Fisher Jurvetson managing director, told the Business Journal last year.

The company selected University Research Park—owned and operated by Irvine Company—for its academic ties, as well as its proximity to John Wayne and Los Angeles International airports and major freeways, according to Brian Wong, Enevate’s chief executive.

“Enevate intends to revolutionize 3G and 4G smartphones and tablets by achieving significantly longer battery runtime,” Wong said. “University Research Park, alongside a university that is a leader in energy storage, is the perfect setting to do that.”

Other University Research Park tenants include Broadcom, San Jose-based network gear maker Cisco Systems Inc., and computer chipmaker Intel Corp. of Santa Clara.

UCI Ties

Enevate’s technology evolved from research by its cofounders: Benjamin Park, now the company’s chief technology officer and a former researcher at University of California, Irvine; and Marc Madou, a UC Irvine professor who also sits on the company’s technical advisory board.

It spun out of UCI in 2005.

The company picked 101 Theory Drive for the building’s existing chemical laboratory space that Enevate plans to customize. The building once was used by noted UCI neuroscientist and entrepreneur Gary Lynch, who garnered somewhat of a cult-like following among peers for his meticulous research on the brain and quirky style.

Lynch, an eccentric and demanding personality, was profiled in the 2010 book “101 Theory Drive: A Neuroscientist’s Quest for Memory” by Terry McDermott.

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