Solazyme, Inc., a renewable oil production company and leader in algal synthetic biology, announced that it has surpassed $76 million in funding, which includes a $57 million Series C financing round that just closed. Solazyme uses microalgae biotechnology to produce fuels, green chemicals, edible oils and health and wellness products.
Braemar Energy Ventures and Lightspeed Venture Partners led the financing round and were joined by other new investors including VantagePoint Venture Partners. All major existing investors participated in the round, including The Roda Group, Harris and Harris Group, and Solazyme Chairman Jerry Fiddler.
The round also included new strategic investors in key target markets, Solazyme said. All funding has been dispersed to Solazyme and will be used to move the company to commercialization.
"Solazyme’s mission is to answer the increasing global demand for clean and renewable sources of oil. We offer sustainable and scalable technology that provides unique solutions for addressing four of the largest challenges facing our country and our planet: increasing energy demand, heightened energy security needs, energy related environmental degradation and hunger," said Jonathan Wolfson, CEO of Solazyme.
"Since 2001 VantagePoint Venture Partners has focused its CleanTech efforts on identifying and investing in the leading company in those sectors best addressing the issues of natural resource limitations, climate change and energy independence," said Stephan Dolezalek, Managing Director and CleanTech Group Lead, VantagePoint Venture Partners. "The potential role of algae in achieving these targets has long been clear, but it has taken a while for a definitive category leader to arise. We believe that Solazyme has now emerged as the preeminent player in the algal biomaterials and biofuels sector.”
Solazyme’s renewable oil production process grows algae in the dark in an industrial fermentation process, where the algae are fed non-food biomass and industrial byproducts including a wide variety of cellulosic materials and low-grade waste glycerol which are converted by the algae into oil.
Solazyme is currently producing thousands of gallons of oil in commercial scale facilities and has produced in-specification fuels including renewable diesel, biodiesel and jet fuel. Solazyme’s first fuel, SoladieselTM, has been successfully road tested as an unblended fuel (100%) for thousands of miles in a variety of unmodified vehicles. Additionally, Solazyme says its process is the first bridge from non–food carbohydrates and industrial waste streams to edible and renewable oils.
Solazyme was founded in 2003 and headquartered in San Francisco.
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