Project Study with Proxima Fusion.
📌 Key facts
💡 Background
Proxima Fusion is Europe's fastest-growing fusion company, building the first generation of fusion power plants based on quasi-isodynamic (QI) stellarators. In July 2026, Proxima raised €411 million - one of the largest rounds ever raised by a European deep tech company. With this money, they are pursuing an ambitious roadmap to build the Alpha demonstration stellarator by the early 2030s, and the Stellaris power plant by the late 2030s.
Building the Stellarator requires solving technical challenges across high-temperature superconducting magnets, cryogenics, computational design and optimization, precision manufacturing, and materials. Several of these solutions also have commercial value in other industries. Identifying which of them to commercialize, for whom, and when, is thus a highly relevant strategic question.
✨The Project
Proxima Fusion will share a portfolio of technologies and capabilities developed on the path to Stellaris. Each student owns one of them and builds the evidence ase for a commercial recommendation,following a common template so the results can be compared across technologies.
For your technology, you will deliver:
- Market sizing: TAM, SAM and SOM for the European market, build bottom-up with documented sources and assumptions
- Customer breakdown: who buys, how they procure, what they decide on, and under which regulatory or certification conditions
- Competitive landscape: incumbents and substitutes in Europe and beyond, and where Proxima has a right to win
- Pricing and business model: willingness to pay, and whether Proxima should enter through direct sales, licensing, partnership or joint development
- Recommendation: pursue, park or drop, with time to first revenue and the capabilities Proxima would need to build
Across the team, you will:
- Agree on common evaluation criteria with Proxima in the first weeks, so the recommendations can be ranked against each other
- Conduct expert and customer interviews with potential industry buyers, partners, and domain experts
🎯 Your Goals
The project has one central question: are the technologies you were given commercially viable in the European market over the next few years, and if so, in which segments and on what timeline? At the end you should be able to give Proxima a clear answer, backed by your benchmarking, competitor and market analysis, regulatory checks, and interviews. If the answer for a given technology is no, that is a useful result too, as long as you can show how you got there.
What you should have produced by the end of the project:
- One market assessment per technology following the template above, with a clear pursue, park or drop recommendation and the underlying analysis (market model, competitor overview, customer and regulatory findings, interview notes)
- A cross-technology ranking against the criteria agreed with Proxima, and a proposed sequence for which opportunities to pursue first and why
- A final presentation to Proxima's leadership and a written report that meets the requirements of the Chair for Strategy and Organization
🎓 Your Profile
- Genuine curiosity about deep tech, energy, and hardware
- Willingness and ability to get comfortable with technical concepts quickly
- Comfortable conducting interviews with senior industry experts and structuring ambiguous problems
- Comfortable building and defening a market model in Excel
- Strong analytical skills and the ability to work independently in a small team
- Available full time for 3–4 consecutive months
- Background in engineering or physics is helpful but not a requirement
📄 Requirements
- Duration: 3-4 months
- Starting date: September - November 2026
- Group: 3–5 students
- Language: Exceptional English skills are essential, as you will work in a group of international stakeholders
- Confidentiality: All team members sign an NDA with Proxima Fusion before the technology briefings
📝 How to Apply
If you are interested, please contact Philipp Sonnenschein and Julien Warnery via email (Subject: Application TUM Proxima Fusion Project Study - [Name]) by submitting your CV and grade report. Please also outline your relevant experience (technical and commercial) and your ideal start date.
We're greatly looking forward to hearing more about you!
🗨️ Contact
Philipp Sonnenschein (Chair for Strategy & Organization)
Julien Warnery (Proxima Fusion)