Building the Smart Factory: Turning a Manufacturing Idea into a 500 MWh Reality in 9 Months
- Emin Askerov
- Jul 10
- 3 min read
In the battery world, execution often lags ambition. Factories get announced, funding gets press-released, and then… silence. Because between a PowerPoint and a product, there's a factory. And building one is hard.
That’s why I want to talk about Duke Oh.
He’s not a battery scientist. Not an IP hoarder. He doesn't pitch solid-state cathodes or next-gen electrolytes. He has 20+ years of experience in Korean battery manufacturing and is the founder of JR Energy Solution, a company that builds batteries for others.
More precisely: they build electrodes as a service, for startups and new battery players who want to scale fast but can’t afford their own production lines. Think of JR as the TSMC of batteries, minus the media spotlight. But that’s what makes it interesting.
This post is about how Duke went from idea to operational factory in under 9 months—and what practical lessons it offers for cleantech scale-ups.
1. The Foundry Model: A Quiet Revolution
Duke’s idea wasn’t new tech. It was a new role in the battery value chain. While others chase patents and performance metrics, JR Energy chose to become a neutral, chemistry-agnostic manufacturing partner. They don't sell cells. They don’t design battery packs. They just make high-quality electrodes, reliably and at scale, for others.
The idea is elegant: help startups and new battery players bypass the capex trap.
If you're a startup with a promising anode or cathode, what you lack is not ambition—it's a clean room, a coating line, and a team that knows what they're doing.
That’s what JR Energy offers. Manufacturing-as-a-service. A foundry for battery electrodes.
2. Funding Strategy: No VCs, Just Industry
The usual route would be a few million in VC funding, a pitch deck full of traction curves, and a long pre-revenue runway. Duke did the opposite.
He raised $40 million, not from financial investors, but from strategic partners:
Equipment suppliers who became both vendors and shareholders.
Materials providers who saw value in supporting their downstream client.
Future customers who wanted reliable supply.
In Duke’s words:
“They trusted me because they knew the market—and because I wasn’t asking them to imagine the future. I was showing them how we’d build it.”
The JR founding team also had skin in the game, investing $1 million of their own capital—not symbolic equity—real cash. That changed how partners listened.
3. Speed by Design: How to Build a Smart Factory in 8–9 Months
Here’s where it gets impressive. From founding to commissioning, Duke and his team took just 9 months to make the first factory operational. How? This is his five-step framework:
Step 1: Parallel Planning
Factory design, equipment selection, and fundraising happened simultaneously. Not sequentially. No "wait for permits, then order machines." Everything ran in parallel. This required precise coordination, but it shaved months off the timeline.
Step 2: Early Equipment Orders
JR didn’t wait for construction to finish. They pre-ordered all key equipment before breaking ground, working closely with top-tier Korean suppliers. By the time walls were up, machines were arriving.
Step 3: Top-Tier Partners
The facility was co-designed with a firm that had built factories for SK On and LG. Suppliers like PNT and Young FNC treated the project as a priority, partly because they were investors.
Step 4: Smart Scope
JR’s first factory wasn’t massive—500 MWh/year—but it was enough to serve initial clients and prove quality. It also helped avoid the trap of building a giga-scale facility with no customers or cash flow.
Step 5: Strong Team
The core execution team came from established players like SK and LG. They knew the timelines, standards, and where things usually go wrong.
4. The Real Bottleneck Isn’t Tech—It’s Execution
Duke’s story isn’t flashy. There are no press releases about “game-changing chemistry.” What JR Energy did was execute—on time, on budget, and on purpose. In cleantech, that’s rare.
Most companies in this space underestimate how hard it is to build at scale. Or they focus on the next round of funding rather than the first day of production.
JR’s approach shows another way. Start with something boring but vital. Raise from partners who understand what you’re doing. And build faster by planning in parallel and delivering what you promise.
5. What This Means for Scale-Ups
If you're in cleantech and stuck between prototype and production, ask yourself:
Can your product be manufactured in someone else’s factory?
Can you borrow execution before you raise $100M to own it?
And if you do plan to build—can you coordinate fundraising, equipment, and construction as one project?
It’s not about scale for scale’s sake. It's about smart sequencing, partner alignment, and speed without shortcuts.
JR’s model won’t work for everyone. But for companies in batteries, electrochemistry, or even hydrogen components, this is a playbook worth studying.
📩 Want help figuring out your manufacturing strategy, investor targeting, or smart factory rollout? That’s what I do.
Watch the full interview with Duke here: https://www.askerov.pro/scale-up-and-foak-podcast-and-video?wix-vod-video-id=9ee563c4754e4333a12173eaa4793ae5&wix-vod-comp-id=comp-lsadk39d
