There is a beige and curved lounger in the Feilmeiers’ living room. Franz-Josef Feilmeier (40) calls it his thinker’s couch. If the entrepreneur thinks here, with a view of the trees, the trampoline and his children playing, then it could be that another piece of the puzzle for the energy transition is being conceived – made in Lower Bavaria.
Feilmeier is the man with vision at Fenecon, a medium-sized manufacturer of electricity storage devices in Deggendorf. The EUPD Research database lists Fenecon among the top ten producers of home storage systems on the German market. Started as a garage in 2011, Fenecon has recently grown strongly: the workforce has tripled to 300 people since 2020, sales were 92 million euros in 2022, and this year it is expected to be 170 million euros. His wife Alexandra (37) and brother Stefan Feilmeier (37) are also members of the management team. The advantage of a family business? “The unconditional trust,” says Feilmeier.
Fenecon GmbH, Deggendorf
The Entrepreneur Franz-Josef Feilmeier (40) worked on the first electricity storage system in a garage. The business graduate and family man founded Fenecon in his hometown of Deggendorf in 2011. He had previously built photovoltaic systems and learned about battery technology for electric vehicles at MAN in China.
The company Fenecon offers batteries in variable sizes, and Feilmeier and his brother Stefan (37) initiated the open source platform FEMS for the control software. With 300 employees, the company recently achieved sales of 92 million euros – and is now targeting industrial customers with storage from electric cars.
To date, Fenecon has sold and rented its electricity storage units primarily to private customers who temporarily store energy from photovoltaic systems and refuel their electric cars from charging stations. Fenecon storage units have sophisticated energy management: software proactively controls the charging and discharging of the batteries. The weather forecast and also the development of electricity prices on the stock exchange are taken into account, explains Feilmeier. Purchases are made at times when there is a lot of cheap renewable energy on the market. Artificial intelligence coordinates purchases and consumption so that there is no need to react ad hoc. “Our claim is: Everything we develop should lead to a world in which we are supplied entirely by renewable energies,” explains Feilmeier.
Use surpluses sensibly
While new batteries made of lithium iron phosphate are installed in smaller home and commercial storage systems, Fenecon has created an innovation for large industrial storage systems: it connects dozens of car batteries to form a storage system. The Fenecon mastermind received EU funding of 4.5 million euros for this idea of a CarBatteryReFactory, which will be built at a new production site in Iggensbach, 20 kilometers away, by the end of 2023. The fact that he installs used batteries from electric cars or uses surplus ones is a win-win situation. Vehicle manufacturers are grateful that he takes the batteries from them and integrates them into his container storage systems.
Business economist Feilmeier explains the logic of his business: Car manufacturers have to pre-produce electric car batteries and often have surpluses. To prevent them from breaking, they have to stay active. And by installing discarded batteries in its storage systems, Fenecon is complying with EU recycling requirements. A battery that has been around for ten years could serve well in the stationary storage for another ten years, and a new one could last up to 20 years.
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The boss is well connected and says about himself: “I’m a yes man”
Photo: Christine Brandl / manager magazin
Fenecon sells the outdoor storage units or rents them out to customers with seasonal needs. Two industrial storage systems are to come off the production line every day – the batteries from 40 to 50 electric cars will be recycled. Behind the energy management system called FEMS is an open source platform; Fenecon creates interfaces to its system via apps. A charging station for electric cars or a heat pump can also be easily connected to the storage system. For example, companies can combine solar energy and charging stations with a commercial storage facility in their parking spaces. A small commercial storage system starts with 30 kilowatts of power. This can be expanded up to 90 kilowatts using additional battery modules as required. “Avoid laying thick cables and get power exactly where it is needed,” advertises Fenecon. The large industrial storage unit promises 736 kilowatts of power. “Cut load peaks, optimize self-consumption, participate in the energy market” – this is the promise for industrial customers.
Breakthrough with stackable battery modules
Many years of technical development go into the products. Today Feilmeier is reaping the benefits. “We put a lot of work into improving the first devices,” he says. The breakthrough came with the stackable battery modules, which run efficiently at high voltage and can be easily connected using plugs. The Fenecon storage units with the drawer principle are easier to transport than complete systems and quicker to install, no IT knowledge is required.
The Chinese company also benefited BYD, now the market leader in home storage Germany, from Feilmeier’s developments. He has an intensive history with BYD, also known for its electric cars. As a student he did an internship at MAN in China, at that time an electric bus fleet was advertised for the Olympics in Beijing. MAN lost the competition against BYD. “I’ve followed them a little bit since then,” says Feilmeier. After studying business administration, he built photovoltaic systems in his uncle’s company and bought the solar modules from BYD in China. When father Josef Feilmeier wanted to use solar energy to run his animal feed warehouse in 2011, a power storage system was needed. The stubborn father wanted to remain independent and not feed his electricity into the grid.
Selected finalists in the sustainability category
Expand the Cubos area
Founded in 2018, Wolfburger Cubos Service GmbH acts as a full-service provider for the charging infrastructure for electric cars and the corresponding energy management. Managing director Marc Wille (57) primarily focuses on companies that are increasingly converting their fleet to electric vehicles. Cubos then plans and builds tailor-made charging solutions at the company headquarters, whether outside or in the parking garage – often combined with a photovoltaic system. According to the company, a patent has been filed for the Cubos wallboxes, which allow bidirectional charging. The operating and billing software is our own creation – and Wille, with its expertise in consumption allocation, also names demanding homeowners’ associations as a target group.
Expand the Thebes area
It all started in 1921 with a staircase lighting timer from Paul Schwenk, now celebrated by the company as the “birth of building automation”. 102 years later, great-grandson Paul Sebastian Schwenk (42) is CEO of Theben AG (145 million euros in sales, 800 employees, 60 percent export quota), which specializes in solutions for energy efficiency in buildings. The portfolio also includes timers with which Theben supplies the global market, as well as presence and motion detectors and smart home systems based on the KNX building automation standard. Schwenk has big goals: He wants to digitize the energy transition with smart solutions. The name comes from the city in ancient Egypt that fascinated the founder.
Open the Börlind area
Nicolas (39) and Alicia Lindner (34) shared an apartment in Stuttgart when Alicia was still at school. Since 2020, the siblings have been running the family business in Calw, which was founded by their grandmother in 1959, as dual leadership. Börlind GmbH (sales of 57 million euros, 260 employees) produces personal care products and cosmetics based on natural raw materials, such as the Dado Sens care line for sensitive skin. “What I can’t eat, I won’t put on my skin,” was the motto of founder Annemarie Lindner, who moved from the GDR to the Black Forest. Börlind doesn’t just stand for research in natural cosmetics. As a mother of three, Alicia Lindner is also committed to diversity and equality in companies.
Back then, there was no electricity storage system without a connection to the grid. So Franz-Josef Feilmeier founded his own company at the age of 28, had the storage units built by BYD and sold them in Germany. He rented an office in Deggendorf; there was space for testing and development in his father’s garage. The technical breakthrough came with storage from BYD, which was further developed accordingly. When Fenecon wanted to produce under its own name and concluded contracts with its competitor CATL, BYD withdrew. “It was almost like a broken love,” Feilmeier remembers. Feilmeier could not yet have imagined how great the need for battery recycling solutions would be among car manufacturers.
The next step in evolution only came about after a request from DHL. Would Fenecon also be able to use used batteries from its e-street scooter fleet in power storage systems? Feilmeier agreed, even though it was new territory. “Suddenly we had to be able to do it.” Belong today BMW and Renault to the customer base.
Don’t be afraid to make political statements
“It sounds stupid, but I’m a yes man,” says Feilmeier. For him that means seizing opportunities. When it comes to his core topic, he doesn’t shy away from political debate. He gave a speech at a demo against the Bavarian Economics Minister Hubert Aiwanger (52; Free Voters), who had railed against the federal government and the heating law in front of 13,000 people in Erding. At election campaign appointments in Aiwanger’s Lower Bavaria constituency, Feilmeier defended his vision of renewables. He is building a wind turbine at the new Iggensbach location. “The first in the area,” he says proudly. He is a member of the CDU Economic Council and the Green Economic Dialogue, both economic interest groups in Berlin. An FDP Bundestag delegation who believes in the future of nuclear power recently visited him. Feilmeier tried to convince them that electricity from renewable sources was safe, cost-effective and clean.
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Many colleagues in the team share his vision. Numerous young engineers come directly from universities in the region. They like to celebrate shared successes, even in unconventional ways. At the Christmas party, the boss dresses up and takes his team on a dream trip into the future of Fenecon, where everyone closes their eyes. “I experience that our vision is present in people’s subconscious,” claims Feilmeier and relies on the strength of the team: “If everyone knows where we want to go, in the end we don’t need much leadership.”
Feilmeier has brought a colleague from the automotive industry who often has different views and acts more cautiously into the management team. The calm that the man brings is necessary. So that he doesn’t rush forward too quickly.