Fraunhofer spin-off Qurie receives 2.2 million euros

The Freiburg-based startup Qurie GmbH has completed seed financing in the amount of 2.2 million euros. The investors are High-Tech Gründerfonds, TT49 and Aepikur GmbH. The startup was founded in 2026 as a spin-off of the Fraunhofer Institute for Physical Measurement Techniques IPM and develops electrocaloric cooling systems that are designed to work entirely without traditional compressors and conventional refrigerants.

Cooling through electric fields instead of compression

While conventional cooling systems are based on the compression and evaporation of refrigerants, Qurie relies on so-called electrocaloric materials.

With our heat pipe approach, we dissipate heat in the system very efficiently and can achieve significantly higher pumping frequencies than was previously possible with heat transport via liquids. This makes our technology truly competitive for the first time.

Dr. Kilian Bartholomé, CTO and co-founder of Qurie

Certain ceramics and polymers change their temperature as soon as electric fields are applied or removed. The company uses this physical effect to develop cooling systems with minimal mechanical components. At the heart of the technology is a patented active electrocaloric heat pipe (AEH), which has been researched and tested for more than ten years at the Fraunhofer Institute for Physical Measurement Techniques IPM.

Higher energy efficiency than conventional cooling systems

According to the company, the technology achieves theoretical efficiencies of over 80 percent. Conventional compressor systems, on the other hand, achieve a maximum of around 50 percent.

This could potentially save around 40 percent energy. At the same time, the technology works without climate-damaging refrigerants. A real win-factor in view of the stricter EU F-Gas Regulation, which increasingly regulates the use of certain refrigerants.

Enclosure air conditioning

Qurie GmbH's first target market is the air conditioning of electrical enclosures. In this area, high demands are placed on precision, reliability and energy efficiency.

In the long term, however, the company is planning significantly broader applications. These include commercial cooling systems, medical technology, electronics cooling, building technology and applications in the automotive industry. The compact solid-state architecture of the technology opens up new form factors, for example for mobile chip cooling or medical devices.

Research spin-off with an interdisciplinary team

Christian Vogel and Kilian Bartholomé are behind the start-up. The team consists of more than ten experts from the fields of materials science, thermodynamics and engineering.

Further development will also be supported by a research program from the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy until the end of 2026.

Investors see regulatory and technological turning point

Qurie solves a problem that has plagued the refrigeration industry for decades: moving away from climate-damaging refrigerants and inefficient compressors - without compromising on costs.

Dr. Gernot Berger, Senior Investment Manager, HTGF

Investors also see considerable transformation potential in the refrigeration industry. In particular, the combination of regulatory pressure, increasing efficiency requirements and the abandonment of conventional refrigerants is seen as a driver for new technologies. High-Tech Gründerfonds particularly emphasizes the technological maturity, the patent basis and the many years of research at Fraunhofer IPM as decisive factors for the investment.