Everactive: Pioneering Battery‑Less Sensors for Industrial IoT

Bob Nunn has navigated the startup landscape since 1989, starting at Vitesse Semiconductor—a 30‑employee firm that grew into a multi‑billion‑dollar valuation in ten years. That early experience cemented his belief in building teams around breakthrough technology.

After leading companies ranging from garage‑based ventures to 500‑employee enterprises and stints at Fulcrum Microsystems and Intel, Nunn sought the startup that could most radically change the world. He found it in Everactive, a company founded by MIT professors Ben Calhoun and David Wentzloff, both experts in ultra‑low‑power electronics.

Everactive’s core promise is simple yet transformative: eliminate batteries from industrial IoT sensors. By doing so, the company enables continuous, data‑rich monitoring that can generate new insights across entire factories, rather than just isolated devices.

Creating a truly battery‑free sensor is a full‑stack challenge. It requires advanced energy harvesting, efficient networking, low‑power radios, and edge processing—all tailored to industrial environments. Everactive’s team has engineered a stack that captures data from heat, light, and pressure without ever needing a battery.

To turn this technology into a viable business, Everactive focused on the industrial sector—where IoT adoption has been hampered by the cost and logistics of battery replacement. The company offers a data‑as‑a‑service model: customers receive actionable insights on specific assets and environments, freeing them to invest in preventive maintenance rather than reactive fixes.

A flagship application is steam‑trap monitoring. With 50–60 million steam traps worldwide, inefficient or blocked traps lead to energy loss and safety hazards. Everactive’s sensors harvest heat from steam pipes or ambient light to continuously report trap status, enabling immediate repairs and significant energy savings for manufacturers, hospitals, and district‑heating operators.

Beyond steam, Everactive monitors refinery flares, motors, pumps, fans, and other rotating equipment. Its goal is to cover every critical asset in a plant, providing a holistic view that drives reliability and cost reduction.

Nunn chose Everactive because it met three non‑negotiable criteria: ambition, capital, and unique technology. The company secured $60 million to date, led early by NEA, and has grown from 30 to over 50 employees.

“Our ambition is to change the world,” Nunn says. “Everactive’s technology could transform how industries collect and act on data, making maintenance proactive and energy waste a thing of the past.”

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Bob Nunn

Everactive’s steam‑trap monitoring technology is powered exclusively by the heat of steam pipes or low levels of indoor light.