DCVC Welcomes 2022

As we look back on 2021, we are grateful for the contri­bu­tions from our DCVC team, the commitment of our investors, and the breakout successes we saw across our portfolio.

We are partic­u­larly proud of our portfolio companies working to mitigate the climate crisis. We made our first climate tech investment in 2012, and it continues to be an important focus for us. Deep Tech provides a lens and toolkit to find and help entre­pre­neurs who are tackling climate problems, with real line-of-sight to venture scale outcomes.

Throughout the past year, we continued to see entre­pre­neurs and investors join DCVC, demon­strating that Deep Tech can solve trillion-dollar global problems, making a positive impact on the world, while simul­ta­ne­ously generating enormous profits.

In 2021, we saw significant milestones for DCVC’s investment strategy and growth:

• It was a stellar year for value creation with over $5.8 billion in gross proceeds from 9 DCVC portfolio companies going public.
• We led 14 rounds in new or existing core investments in companies including Pivot Bio, BioPhero, CH4 Global, Kairos Aerospace, Plotlogic, and Reach Labs.
• 18 large follow-on rounds in high-performing companies such as Carbon Health, Mythic, Primer, Tala, and Twelve, which raised an aggregate of $1.5 billion.
• The addition of new Partners with extensive knowledge in fundamental life and computer sciences with successful track-records finding, funding, and growing break­through Deep Tech ventures: Jason Pontin and Dr. Eric Shiozaki, as well the addition of our first Marketing Partner, Wendy A.M. Yale, in our expanded commitment to providing brand narrative and company-building expertise for our portfolio.

Technical break­throughs across the portfolio fuel our optimism for the future: from Brimstone’s novel ability to produce Portland cement without CO2; Agility Robotics’ robots engineered to work alongside people, in spaces built for people; Orca Bio’s seminal clinical trial results in treating blood cancers; Petra’s radically cheaper tunneling technology to put fire-prone utility infra­struc­ture underground; to Totus’ drug development technology that designs covalent molecules to drug the undruggable, helping eliminate the era of untreatable diseases.

These are just a few examples of Deep Tech companies accel­er­ating scientific and tech­no­log­ical break­throughs to enable a safer and healthier world, while making the benefits of capitalism more equitable. Here’s to the promise of another trans­for­ma­tional year for our portfolio companies, our partners, and DCVC!

- Matt and Zack

In 2021, 9 DCVC Companies Celebrated Public Offerings with Over $5.8 Billion in Gross Proceeds.

A Few Highlights…

“EMBARK IS RESHAPING SUPPLY CHAINS AND THE FUTURE OF TRANS­PORTA­TION” — FORBES

RFDA GRANTS FAST TRACKING TAG FOR REC-2282 IN NF‑2 MUTATED MENINGIOMAS — SEEKING ALPHA

ROCKET LAB GIVES FIRST LOOK AT PLANS FOR BIGGER, REUSABLE NEUTRON ROCKET AS IT TAKES ON SPACE X — CNBC

THE LARGEST CYBER SECURITY IPO OF ALL TIME — FORBES

“IT IS A GAME CHANGER: WAGING WAR ON CLIMATE CHANGE FROM SPACE” — POLITICO

SCHOOLS SELECT EVOLV FOR STUDENT SAFETY – WBNG CBS

Ones to Watch

DCVC Private Companies Continued to Drive Deep Tech Innovation in 2021.

Brimstone

Mission: Our mission is to eliminate industrial greenhouse gas emissions by developing tech­nolo­gies to help industries transition faster to net-zero.

Cement is responsible for 8% of global emissions — but it doesn’t have to be

“Entre­pre­neurs have struggled for decades to develop cement formulas that sequester more CO2, or provide equal strength with less mass, or mix the ingredients of cement in less-polluting proportions,” says Zachary Bogue, co-founder, and managing partner of DCVC, which just invested in a seed round of funding for Brimstone along with Break­through Energy Ventures. ​“None of the alter­na­tives worked very well: Seques­tra­tion captured just a fraction of the CO2, and messing with cement’s recipe worried regulators concerned with structural integrity.” Read the Full ​‘Fast Company’ Article.

Caption Health

Mission: To detect disease early — when there is the highest potential for impact — by leveraging artificial intel­li­gence and ultrasound. We are a team of best-in-class entre­pre­neurs, engineers, and clinicians who are committed to trans­forming care, expanding access, and reducing costs.

The Best Inventions of 2021. Sonograms Made Simpler

“You can’t send every single person to a cardi­ol­o­gist every year,” says Kilian Koepsell, Caption Health’s co-founder, and CTO. ​“But you can go to a regular checkup with your primary care physician, and with these tech­nolo­gies they can screen you much better than it was possible before.” Read the full ​‘TIME’ Article.

Oklo

Mission: To make micro-nuclear reactors use the spent fuel from conven­tional nuclear reactors to provide clean energy.

A New Generation of Nuclear Reactors Could Hold the Key to a Green Future

Fission isn’t for the faint of heart. Building a working reactor — even a very small one — requires precise and painstaking efforts of both engineering and paper pushing. Oklo plans to flip the switch on their first reactor around 2023, a mere decade after co-founding the company. After that, they want to do for neigh­bor­hood nukes what Tesla has done for electric cars: use a niche and expensive first version as a stepping-stone toward cheaper, bigger, higher-volume products. Read the Full ​‘TIME’ Article

Gro Intel­li­gence

Mission: To make agri­cul­tural, climate, and economic data actionable. Food security and climate risk represent existential global-sized oppor­tu­ni­ties for our AI-powered decisions and insights platform.

The 100 Most Influential People of 2021: Sara Menker –

Watch the ​‘TIME’ Video.

Petra

Misson: Petra’s mission is to protect life and property by changing the feasibility of under­grounding utilities. We want to make under­grounding possible and affordable in every region and for every community in the world.

This New Tech Cuts Through Rock Without Grinding Into It

A startup called Petra uses super-hot gas to penetrate bedrock. The method could make it cheaper to move utilities underground — and make electric lines safer. ​“It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before,” Goodfellow says. ​“There’s been talk about things like nuclear-powered tunnel-boring machines and contactless tunneling and stuff like that, but it’s just been talking prototypes. As far as I know, these are the first people that are trying to really, genuinely commer­cialize it.” Read the Full ​‘WIRED’ Article.

Pivot Bio

Mission: To replace synthetic nitrogen fertilizer with a more sustainable and safer tool for farmers.

Pivot Bio, A Startup Using Microbes to Replace Synthetic Fertilizer

A startup born in the lab of University of California, Berkeley, is aiming to replace synthetic fertilizers that contribute to greenhouse gases and so-called ​‘dead zones’ in the ocean. ​“Our pitch to growers today is, instead of spending a dollar on nitrogen fertilizer, spend a dollar on Pivot’s nitrogen,” said Karsten Temme, Pivot Bio’s co-founder and CEO about how their products are already cost competitive. Read the Full ​‘Reuters’ Article.

Totus Medicines

Mission: To end the era of untreatable disease.

This Biotech Company Raised $40 Million
To Develop Treatments For ​‘Undruggable’ Diseases

I’ve had the experience of losing a number of loved ones to specif­i­cally untreatable diseases,” says Totus Medicines CEO Neil Dhawan. ​“And I spent a lot of time in doctors’ offices growing up, where there was nothing more devastating than having a patient where there’s nothing you can do to actually help them.” It was this experience that led Dhawan, 33, to cofound Totus Medicines in 2019. Read the Full ​‘Forbes’ Article.

Twelve

Mission: We are a team of scientists, engineers, and problem-solvers on a mission to funda­men­tally shift the way the world addresses climate change and lead the transition to a fossil-free future with our carbon transformation technology.

Are Green Jet Fuels Finally Ready for Takeoff?

Twelve’s core technology is a suitcase-sized elec­tro­chem­ical reactor that uses a proprietary catalyst to transform CO2 into fuel using water and electricity. Their idea is to line up stacks of these reactors next to an airborne stream of carbon dioxide being emitted from cement, steel, or other industrial facilities, then turn it into hydrocarbon fuel. Read the Full ​‘WIRED’ Article.

DCVC Deep Dive

Deep Tech is shaping climate change, life sciences, and industrial processes. Keep up with the latest innovations of our portfolio companies in our DCVC Blog. Here are some of our top posts from 2021…