On Wednesday, Japanese sōgō shōsha (global integrated goods conglomerate) Sumitomo Corporation‘s Americas subsidiary (SCOA) announced that its corporate venture capital arm, Presidio Ventures, is making a strategic investment, as part of a Series B venture capital round, in California lithium mining technology company Lilac.
Lilac says it will use new funds to build a dedicated factory in the U.S. to produce the ion-exchange beads used in its extraction technology, deploy its product at multiple projects in the U.S., South America, and Europe, and to hire more people.
“We’re excited to contribute to the sustainable expansion of the world’s lithium’s supply through our investment into Lilac solutions,” said Presidio Ventures CEO Doug Kuribayashi. “We believe that Sumitomo Corporation of Americas’ expertise and significant experience in the management and operations of the mining business, together with its global network in trading raw materials for battery production, will add value to Lilac Solutions in the future.”
Lilac is built around Direct Lithium Extraction (DLE) technology, which it says is significantly more effective, faster to deploy, less expensive and more sustainable than conventional lithium production methods. DLE is reportedly useful in tapping into brine (natural saltwater) resources at mines that typically contain low levels of lithium and high impurities, and despite containing much of the world’s lithium reserves, have been considered largely unusable until recently.
“Electric vehicles are a low-carbon success story and are poised for decades of growth, but the lithium raw materials needed for batteries have become a serious bottleneck,” said Lilac CEO and Founder Dave Snydacker in a comment on the round. “The lithium industry has been plagued with technical and environmental problems that have put future supply in jeopardy. Lilac’s technology solves the fundamental challenges of lithium production from brine resources, and our team is thrilled to deploy globally with support from investors like Presidio Ventures and its parent company, SCOA.”
SCOA–which has extensive experience and wide network of clients and suppliers within the global mining sector–said in its own statement that Presidio Ventures “anticipates myriad opportunities to help scale and apply Lilac’s unique solution throughout the company’s vast business network.” The corporation added that Lilac’s technology has the potential to catalyze lithium production and increase supply, a welcome solution to the growing demand for global electrification.
According to IEA’s Global EV Outlook, electric car registrations increased in all major markets in 2020 despite the COVID-19 pandemic, and 18 of the 20 largest OEMs have committed to increase their offer and sale of EVs. With these figures driving the automotive industry toward electrification, the lithium supply chain is going to be a tremendous player in satisfying this consumer demand.
