Planet

Uluu’s products act like plastic but are made from seaweed, not fossil fuels. They’re strong, lightweight and waterproof, while being truly biodegradable and biocompatible. Uluu is naturally produced via fermentation. This process uses saltwater microbes fed with farmed seaweed—a regeneratively-grown feedstock that can be scaled to entirely replace the fossil fuels used to make 400 million tonnes of plastic each year, all while sequestering carbon and bioremediating our oceans. Uluu can be directly substituted for plastic in existing manufacturing equipment, including to produce fibres that can replace polyester in textiles.

Epoch is developing a computational approach to discover and optimise enzymes, which are natural machines that speed up chemical and biological processes. Several industrial and biomedical processes have found enzymes to be extremely valuable in speeding up reaction times, reducing energy requirements and enabling previously impossible reactions. Epoch will eventually develop and commercialise enzymes for several specific needs and use cases including accelerating plastic decomposition.

Space offers an incredible amount of untapped potential that's waiting to be explored. We believe harnessing space's potential can bring improvements to our lives back on Earth, far beyond space tourism. One exciting area is researching in microgravity. What makes research in space so exciting is that up there, nearly everything behaves differently. Yuri unlocks access to microgravity by providing purpose-built labs and factories in space. Yuri facilitates experiments in space to leverage the benefits of microgravity for biological processes such as drug discovery and tissue formation. We can't wait to follow along with Yuri's lift off.

Nanotechnology has for decades been heralded as one of the most promising areas of science and industry. As we increase our capacity to control materials at the nanoscale we will be able to take advantage of countless technological advances that will literally reshape our physical world and accelerate planetary sustainability. Yet until now, nanotechnology has massively underdelivered on its promise. VSPARTICLE, a spin-out of TU Delft in 2014, has over the past six years created a paradigm-changing platform that is a scalable source of nanoparticulate material with broad applicability for scientific, engineering and manufacturing applications. We're excited to watch the VSPARTICLE team forge ahead in this space.

Since the industrial revolution, advancements in manufacturing have enabled mass consumerism to grow exponentially. However consumers are quickly becoming aware of their impact on the environment, demanding more from brands. Enter synthetic biology. Soon we will be able to produce a large share of the global economy's physical materials, without compromising on performance and sustainability. Insempra bridges the gap between synbio R&D and scalable, industrial manufacturing for brands. We believe the Insempra team can accelerate the creation of sustainable alternatives to traditional materials and we’re excited to back them on their journey.

The world’s population is forecast to peak at 10.5 billion around 2050 and while the progress in renewables is encouraging, they cannot provide enough energy for humankind without an ongoing reliance on fossil fuels. In order to sustain economic growth and overcome climate change, the world needs to develop alternatives. We’re excited to back the Marvel Fusion team who’re building a reliable, commercially-viable nuclear fusion power plant. Marvel’s unique design has a genuine shot to get us to clean, safe, abundant power in the next decade to complement intermittent renewables on a pathway to a carbon-free energy grid.