Avangrid hosts eighth annual Innovation Forum at The Engine, founded by MIT

Avangrid, Inc., a leading energy company and member of the Iberdrola Group, hosted its eighth Innovation Forum at The Engine, a nonprofit Tough Tech incubator founded by MIT, to convene key stakeholders to showcase our progress and work towards solving the industry’s biggest challenges with innovation. The event was part of the company’s larger innovation week, which convened more than 150 thought leaders, startups, universities and students through presentations, workshops, a startup pitch competition and a student career fair. The event highlighted the development, scale up, and deployment of innovative technologies like battery storage, artificial intelligence, dynamic line rating and robotics, along with discussion of opportunities for the industry to better collaborate and facilitate the adoption of innovation.

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(From Right to Left) Avangrid CEO Pedro Azagra joins Stan Whittingham, SUNY Binghamton Professor and Nobel Laureate, Yet-Ming Chiang, MIT Professor, Co-Founder at Sublime Systems and Form Energy, and Ben Downing, Chief Growth Officer, The Engine

“Avangrid is deeply committed to developing and implementing the most innovative technologies to enhance the efficiency of our own operations, but also to help the U.S. meet its energy needs,” said Avangrid CEO Pedro Azagra. “The best way to predict the future is to invent it. Avangrid’s Innovation Week was a demonstration of the company’s dedication to innovation and community engagement to advance affordable energy for Americans.”

This event is the culmination of Avangrid’s innovation activities across the 8,000-person company. To demonstrate Avangrid’s dedication to innovation, the company added a startup pitch competition and student career trek to the week of activities. Last year, Avangrid invested $107M in innovation projects and executed more than ten pilot technology projects with innovative companies and startups. Tyba, LineVision and Boston Dynamics are three examples of recent pilots on display at the forum. These pilots are ambitious initiatives in facilitating energy storage deployment, dynamic line rating, and substation operations.

The 2025 Innovation Forum included a distinguished keynote panel to drill down on what it takes to develop and adopt innovation in the energy industry. Yet Ming-Chiang, MIT Professor and Co-Founder of more than six startups, including long duration energy storage company Form Energy and decarbonized cement company Sublime Systems, shared his perspective on scaling “tough tech” at speed. Stan Whittingham, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his development of lithium-ion batteries in 2019 and is now a distinguished professor at SUNY Binghamton, shared his experience from decades of research and development in the industry. He serves as the Chief Innovation Officer of the New Energy New York (NENY) project, a hub for battery innovation led by Binghamton University. Rounding out the keynote panel was Ben Downing, Chief Growth Officer at The Engine, whose mission is to support startup companies working on scientific and technological breakthroughs with the potential for transformative societal impact.

The event also included speakers from Harvard University, the Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO), the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), and the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. On top of critical partnerships with research institutions and startup pilot projects, Avangrid promotes innovation through its One Avangrid Accelerator Program and annual student Hackathon.

During the second day of the event, Avangrid hosted its inaugural Startup Pitch Competitions to select and fund its next pilot projects. In March, the company opened applications to startups aligned with the theme of “optimizing the planning, development and operations of energy assets” and received more than 70 applications. After a rigorous selection process, six innovative startups were invited to present their technologies to a panel of expert judges from Avangrid, The Engine, and NREL during the Forum.

Firescape was selected as the winner for its advanced wildfire risk and mitigation analytics platform designed for utility applications. The company uses remote sensing and machine learning to help utilities assess and manage wildfire threats, plan mitigation strategies, and improve incident response and recovery. The company is based on Albuquerque, New Mexico and is founded by members of Sandia National Labs.

The last portion of Avangrid’s Innovation Week included a Career Trek program for approximately 80 university students, who had the opportunity to hear from senior leaders within the company, learn about open roles, and grow their network.

About Avangrid: Avangrid, Inc. is a leading energy company in the United States working to meet the growing demand for energy for homes and businesses across the nation through service, innovation, and continued investments by expanding grid infrastructure and energy generation projects. Avangrid has offices in Connecticut, New York, Massachusetts, Maine and Oregon, including operations in 23 states with approximately $47 billion in assets, and has two primary lines of business: networks and power. Through its networks business, Avangrid owns and operates eight electric and natural gas utilities, serving more than 3.3 million customers in New York and New England. Through its power generation business, Avangrid owns and operates more than 75 energy generation facilities across the United States producing 10.5 GW of power for over 3.1 million customers. Avangrid employs approximately 8,000 people and has been recognized by JUST Capital as one of the JUST 100 companies – a ranking of America’s best corporate citizens in 2025 for the fifth consecutive year. The company was named among the World’s Most Ethical Companies in 2025 for the seventh consecutive year by the Ethisphere Institute. Avangrid is a member of the group of companies controlled by Iberdrola, S.A. For more information, visit http://www.avangrid.com.

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