Mitsui leads $60m round for NZ cleantech play LanzaTech
Japan's Mitsui & Co has led a $60 million Series D round for New Zealand-based low-carbon fuels producer LanzaTech.
Mitsui put $20 million toward the round with new investors Siemens Venture Capital and China International Capital Corp. (CICC) participating alongside existing backers Khosla Ventures, Qiming Venture Partners, K1W1 and the Malaysian Life Sciences Capital Fund.
LanzaTech was set up in New Zealand in 2005 but now has additional offices in the US, India and China.
The company has developed a gas-liquid fermentation process that produces low carbon fuels and chemicals from waste gas resources obtained from industrial factories, while simultaneously reducing carbon dioxide emissions.
The business expects its first commercial facility, which is being financed by China steel manufacturer Baosteel, to be operational by 2015. The facility will use steel mill off gases to produce fuels and chemicals.
According to AVCJ Research, LanzaTech received its first round of institutional funding in 2007 when Khosla Ventures led a $3.5 million round alongside K1W1 and another unnamed investor. The firm then raised an $18 million Series B round led by Qiming in 2010, which included commitments from Softbank China Venture Capital, Khosla and K1W1.
Qiming, K1W1 and Khosla then returned to take part in $55.8 million round in early 2012, which included Malaysian Life Sciences and Petronas Technology Ventures.
This latest investment will be used to extend LanzaTech's core gas fermentation platform and further develop its product portfolio. The company's products so far include fuels such as ethanol or jet fuel and commodity chemicals such as butadiene used in nylon production or propylene used in plastics manufacturing.
"LanzaTech's unique ability to reduce or eliminate the release of waste gases like carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide has dramatic consequences on the global fight against air pollution - it meets a survival-driven need for places like China and India," said Andrew Chung, a partner at Khosla Ventures.
"LanzaTech offers an effective and capital efficient carbon capture and reuse solution, which is why we have been able to fund commercialization via major industrial partners. It's cleantech done right."
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