🇯🇵 Fusion reactor startup nets $11.6m in series B money

Kyoto Fusioneering, a Japanese startup that develops equipment for the fusion reactor industry, has raised over 1.3 billion yen (US$11.6 million) in its series B round from investors including Coral Capital, JIC Venture Growth Investments, and Jafco Group.

Photo credit: ITER

The company has also secured a loan of 700 million yen (US$6.1 million) from the Bank of Kyoto, Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation, and the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ.

The startup was founded in 2019 by Kyoto University professor Satoshi Konishi, one of the world’s leading experts on fusion engineering, according to Coral Capital. The firm aims to bring clean and sustainable energy to the masses by helping make commercial fusion a reality.

Climate change is life-threatening to humankind, “but if the future of fusion energy is realized, it could become a ‘silver bullet’ that saves the world,” said Yuki Kuwahara, principal of JIC Venture Growth Investments.

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Several venture firms globally have already been established to help realize the potential of fusion reactors, said Kyoto Fusioneering.

In fact, one of the largest projects in the nuclear fusion space is the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor, a plasma-based fusion reactor megaproject backed by a coalition of countries. This includes China, India, Japan, the US, and South Korea, among others.

The latest investment in Kyoto Fusioneering will be used for R&D, as well as the development of fusion reactor heating equipment, heat extraction equipment, and fusion plant engineering.

Other investors in the round include:

• Daiwa Corporate Investment
• DBJ Capital
• JGC Mirai Innovation Fund

Currency converted from Japanese yen to US dollar: US$1 = 114.76 yen.