A team of engineers were working on a second life for electric vehicle batteries when they stumbled across a potentially game-changing discovery.
The crew at Melbourne-based Relectrify have developed a novel "operating system" that can squeeze out 20 per cent more energy over the lifetime of most battery cells compared to conventional systems.
The startup's CEO Jeff Renaud expects the technology to benefit the "missing middle" - business and industrial users whose adoption of power storage lags both households and the grid.
"The payback periods haven't been good enough for business owners to make that investment," he told AAP.
The startup leader is confident the business case can "stand on its own" with the technology, with every extra kilowatt hour translating into either revenue from