Blykalla has appointed Erik Engellau-Nilsson, managing partner of Norrsken Launcher, as chairman of its board.
Engellau-Nilsson is one of the more recognisable figures in Nordic impact tech. He worked alongside Klarna co-founder Niklas Adalberth before the pair built the Norrsken Foundation, which Engellau-Nilsson led as CEO and grew into one of Europe's biggest hubs for impact entrepreneurship.
He now runs Norrsken Launcher, the foundation's deep tech investment arm, which first backed Blykalla in 2022. He has sat on the startup's board since then, and served as interim CEO before current chief executive Jacob Stedman took over.
"As we take the step from development to deployment, his experience in building and scaling ambitious companies is exactly what this next phase demands," Stedman said in a press statement today.
Stockholm-based Blykalla is developing the SEALER, a lead-cooled small modular reactor (SMR) designed to deliver baseload power for energy-hungry industries and data centres. The company spun out of the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in 2013, building on lead-cooled reactor research dating back to 1996.
A 3D render of Blykalla's SEALER reactor. Credit: Blykalla
In December, Blykalla raised $50m in a round co-led by Norrsken Launcher, Zurich-based Armada Investment, and Oklo, the Sam Altman-backed US nuclear firm. Backers included Japanese telecoms giant KDDI and two co-founders of cloud hyperscaler CoreWeave, a sign of where the demand pull is coming from.
"The next geopolitical race won't be for oil. It will be for abundant, reliable electrons," Engellau-Nilsson said in a press statement.
"Advanced nuclear is one of the most important technologies of our time," he added. "Blykalla is exceptionally positioned for this moment."
The chairman swap caps a busy run for the company. In May, Blykalla applied to build a park of six SEALER reactors in Norrsundet, north of Stockholm, a 330 MWe facility it says could power roughly 150,000 households or a medium-sized data centre.
The startup has since applied for Swedish government financing for the project and begun pre-application engagement with the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission. It opened a New York office in March.
Blykalla has also stacked up industrial partnerships, signing a joint development agreement with ABB in April and a memorandum of understanding with Hitachi Energy in June covering grid integration for its reactors.
Its deepening alliance with Oklo now includes plans to deploy $100m-$200m and 30-40 engineers in the US across joint workstreams, per a March agreement.
Blykalla is targeting its first commercial SEALER-55 reactor for operation in the early 2030s.