Mining company Crusoe raised $350 million

Crusoe Energy Systems Inc, a bitcoin-mining company, has closed a $350 million Series C funding round.

It was led by G2 Venture Partners. Participants include: Valor Equity Partners, Lowercarbon Capital, Polychain Capital, Bain Capital Ventures, Founders Fund, MCJ Collective, Winklevoss Capital and others.

One of Crusoe’s new investors is Hollywood star Robert Downey Jr.’s FootPrint Coalition Ventures.

In addition to raising equity capital, the company received lines of credit from SVB Capital, Sparkfund and Generate Capital for up to $155 million.

Crusoe will use the funds to expand its business outside the US, accelerate the launch of its CrusoeCloud cloud computing solution, and increase its team from 157 to 250 people by the end of 2022.

According to a press release, Crusoe has deployed 86 modular Digital Flare Mitigation units. Mobile data centers prevented the flaring of about 71 million m³ of gas, reducing methane emissions by 99.89%. Conventional waste disposal technology releases significant unburned amounts of this greenhouse gas.

Crusoe’s fleet of installations can reduce CO equivalent emissions2 at 650,000 tons per year. This is comparable to removing 140,000 vehicles from the roads, the company estimated.

“Stopping methane emissions from flaring is an immediate and effective step towards climate change mitigation. Crusoe technology transforms gas into valuable computing resources,” said G2 Venture Partners partner Ben Kortlang.

In May 2019 Crusoe raised $4.5 million during a seed round involving venture capital firms Peter Thiel and the Winklevoss brothers. In December of the same year, the company raised $70 million and announced the deployment of 70 Digital Flare Mitigation installations.

Recall, Crusoe became an ExxonMobil partner in the oil giant’s flare gas bitcoin mining pilot project in North Dakota.