Thursday, July 12, 2012

Elevance Renewable Sciences Finds $104M

An Illinois firm whose technology is based on, and licensed from Pasadena-based Materia and Caltech, has raised a whopping, $104M funding round. Woodridge, Illinois-based Elevance Renewable Sciences, a developer of processes for creating specialty chemicals from renewable oils, said the Series E funding came from Lacustrine Limited, a Malaysian investor, along with Total Energy Ventures international. The funding will go towards its strategic growth plans. The funding comes even as Elevance has been awaiting an IPO, which it filed for in September 2011. Elevance is using olefin metathesis technology, licensed from Materia, and originally developed by Noble Prize winning Caltech professor Robert H. Grubbs. Elevance and Materia entered into their licensing deal in November of 2007. Both Caltech and Materia own some equity in Elevance from those licensing transactions. More information »