Infrastructure software company Neara raises $90m

Neara, an Australian software company specialising in physics-enabled digital twin modelling for critical infrastructure, has closed a AU$90 million Series D funding round to accelerate its focus on solving global challenges.

The round was led by global growth equity firm TCV, which has previously invested in technology companies including Netflix, Revolut, Spotify, Toast, Clio, Employment Hero, Nubank, SiteMinder and Xero.

Returning investors included Partners Group, EQT, Square Peg Capital and Skip Capital. Building on Neara’s AU$45 million Series C in late 2024, total funds raised to date have reached approximately AU$180 million.

“This investment marks TCV’s third investment in an Australian-founded, category-defining technology,” said Muz Ashraf, General Partner, TCV.

“We believe the infrastructure challenges facing the world, from climate resilience to energy access for AI compute, require fundamentally new approaches. Neara’s highly differentiated, physics-enabled digital twin platform is a leap forward in how utilities manage their grids. We look forward to supporting Neara in their growth journey as they work to expand their impact globally.”

Mapped powerlines. Image courtesy of Neara.

In the face of a series of global interconnected challenges — aging grid infrastructure, ambitious energy transition goals and the explosive growth of AI compute and data centres — Neara aims to address the common factor constraining progress: access to energy.

The AI and data centre boom requires immense amounts of energy, with global electricity consumption for data centres projected to more than double by 2030, highlighting an urgent need to enhance existing strategies to accelerate access to the grid. Neara’s physics-enabled digital twin technology is designed to target this need, identifying underutilised existing network capacity, accelerating new network infrastructure and renewable generation connections, and supporting grid resilience in an era of unprecedented demand.

“Power grids all over the world are reaching their limits under the combined pressure of AI, electrification and rapidly rising demand,” said Jack Curtis, Co-founder and Chief Commercial Officer at Neara.

“Across energy, transport and communications, systems built for a different era are now being pushed beyond their design assumptions. The world needs faster, more intelligent ways to understand what infrastructure is really capable of and how it behaves in the contexts that matter most.

“Neara grounds every simulation analysis in real-world physics, giving asset owners and operators the confidence to stretch capacity, manage risk and invest where it matters most for both today’s constraints and the demands of the future,” Curtis said.

Neara’s work includes partnerships with global utilities, including Southern California Edison and CenterPoint Energy in the United States. Its European team has worked with ESB Networks (Ireland), Scottish Power (UK) and Hedno (Greece). In Australia, the company said it works with close to 90% of all network utilities, including Essential Energy, Endeavour Energy, Ausgrid, Ausnet, Powercor and SA Power Networks.

The funding from this round will accelerate Neara’s global talent pipeline of machine learning and AI engineers to develop the technology needed to solve critical infrastructure challenges, in addition to further expanding the company’s international commercial footprint.

Top image caption: Transmission clearance. Image courtesy of Neara.