Elevance Renewable Sciences, a US-based maker of specialty chemicals from natural oils spun off from seeds company Cargill in 2005, has raised $100m in its series C round from a consortium including Total Energy Ventures International, the corporate venturing unit of French oil major Total.
Venture capital firm Naxos Capital Partners led the C round, and was joined by private equity firm TPG’s biotech and growth funds.
The round will allow Elevance to build refineries in North and South America and Asia using its technology that allow chemical elements to change places. Earlier this year, Elevance signed a joint venture with Wilmar International to build the world’s largest biorefinery in Indonesia, and a joint development agreement with Stepan Company to commercialize novel surfactants (compounds that lower the surface tension of a liquid ) and anti-microbials (substances that kill or inhibit the growth of micro-organisms, such as bacteria, fungi, or protozoans).
In addition to Wilmar and Stepan, Elevance has Cargill, chemicals group Dow Corning, Evonik Industries, Trent University, Tetramer Technologies, United Soybean Board and SaskCanola among its strategic partners.
In 2007, Elevance raised more than $40m in capital and technology invested by TPG, Cargill and US-based chemical company Materia.