Solazyme Funding Surpasses $76 Million
June 8, 2009
For Immediate Release
Latest funding brings total Series C round to $57 million with investors Braemar Energy Ventures, Lightspeed Venture Partners, The Roda Group and Harris & Harris Group LLC joined by new Series C investors including VantagePoint Venture Partners and strategic investors from key target markets
SOUTH SAN FRANSISCO, California (June 8, 2009) — 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 clean and scalable 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. All funding has been dispersed to Solazyme and will be used to move the company to commercialization.
“This most recent funding validates the unique value of our oil production platform and adds to our already strong financial position. 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.
“Braemar’s mission is to identify and support the most promising alternative energy firms with disruptive technologies that provide meaningful clean energy solutions,” said William Lese of Braemer Energy Ventures. “Solazyme’s renewable oil and advanced biofuels technology is leading the industry on the path to commercialization and will be cleanly powering our vehicles with renewable fuels that fit within the existing infrastructure.”
“Solazyme has proven itself as a pioneer in the advanced biofuels space, by being the first to do many things including scale-up, production and road testing of a variety of advanced biofuels that can simultaneously meet current U.S. fuel specifications while reducing greenhouse gas emissions by over 80%,” said Chris Schaepe, a partner at Lightspeed Venture Partners.
Dan Miller from The Roda Group added, “We are proud to have been an investor in Solazyme since the early seed round, and we are increasingly excited about sizeable opportunities for Solazyme’s renewable oils in all markets from fuels, to cosmetics to nutritional oils.”
“Since 2001 VantagePoint Venture Partners has focused its CleanTech efforts on identifying and investing in leading companies whose technology addresses the critical issues of natural resource limitations, climate change and energy independence,” said Stephan Dolezalek, Managing Director and CleanTech Group Lead, VantagePoint Venture Partners. “While algae’s potential as a clean and renewable energy source has long been clear, we’ve waited for the emergence of a definitive category leader. Now, in Solazyme, we believe we’ve found the company that will become the preeminent player in the algal biomaterials and biofuels sector.”
Solazyme’s unique 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. This allows the company to produce oil cleanly and economically in a controlled, large-scale process. 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’s process is the first bridge from non–food carbohydrates and industrial waste streams to edible and renewable oils. This technology has already been shown to produce high quality oils for a multitude of purposes across a variety of industries.
About Solazyme
Solazyme, Inc. is a renewable oil company and a leader in industrial biotechnology. Founded in 2003 and headquartered in South San Francisco, Solazyme’s proprietary technology transforms a range of low-cost plant-based sugars into high-value oils. Our renewable products can replace or enhance oils derived from the world’s three existing sources—petroleum, plant and animal fats. We tailor the composition of our oils to address specific customer requirements, offering superior performance characteristics at a competitive cost to conventional oils. Solazyme's oils and fuels provide compelling solutions to increasingly complex issues of fuel scarcity, energy security and environmental impact while fitting into the pre-existing multi-trillion dollar fuel infrastructure. Solazyme's investors, among others, include Braemar Energy Ventures, Harris & Harris Group, Lightspeed Venture Partners, The Roda Group, VantagePoint Venture Partners, and Zygote Ventures. For more information, please visit www.solazyme.com.
For more information
- Genet Garamendi
- VP, Corporate Communications
- (650) 963-5228
- press@solazyme.com
About Braemar Energy Ventures
Founded in 2003, Braemar Energy Ventures is a leading venture capital firm focused on investing in transformative energy-tech and related companies contributing to global sustainability and combating climate change. Using sector expertise and experience, Braemar aims to be an engaged partner with its portfolio companies to best help them navigate the path to creating significant global impact. For more information, visit braemarenergy.com.