US-based 3D manufacturing technology provider Carbon has raised $143m from investors including apparel manufacturer Adidas, chemicals producer JSR and industrial product maker General Electric for the first close of its series D round.
The round also featured Baillie Gifford, Fidelity Management & Research Company, Archina Capital, Sequoia Capital, Silver Lake Kraftwerk, Reinet Investments and Emerson Elemental, the environmental arm of non-profit organisation Emerson Collective.
Adidas and General Electric invested through their respective corporate venturing units, Hydra Ventures and GE Ventures. Carbon expects to raise a total of $200m in the round and the size of the first close was revealed through a regulatory filing.
Founded in 2013 and previously known as Carbon3D, Carbon has developed a method of 3D printing called Continuous Liquid Interface Production (CLIP), a photochemical process that uses oxygen and light to rapidly produce objects from resin.
Adidas and Carbon formed a partnership in April this year to create Futurecraft 4D, a platform that can produce custom fit shoes using 3D-printed materials.
Joseph DeSimone, co-founder and CEO of Carbon, said: “Since Carbon first introduced digital light synthesis, we have continuously pushed the boundaries and transformed industries, and are uniquely positioned to take digital manufacturing to an entirely new level.
“This funding will help us realise new classes of workers and business models, where product design and engineering is facilitated by cloud-based computing and a wide range of scanning, sensor and simulation technologies that enable the creation of perfectly tuned – even personalised – products that have been previously impossible to produce.”
The round increased Carbon’s overall funding to $365m. It closed a $181m series C round in September 2016 after it secured $81m from GE Ventures, JSR, automotive manufacturer BMW and optical equipment provider Nikon.
Carbon received the first $100m from GV, a subsidiary of internet technology conglomerate Alphabet, as well as payment technology producer FIS, design software supplier Autodesk, Reinet Fund, Sequoia Capital, Silver Lake, Northgate Capital and private investor Yuri Milner in August 2015.
Autodesk had previously invested $10m in the company in April the same year through its Spark Investment Fund.