Zymergen

Zymergen, founded in 2013 and located in Emeryville, California, is a technology company providing organisms engineering services. Their biotechnology labs rely on advanced manufacturing technologies, machine learning techniques, and genomics to accelerate the design, build, test cycle of microorganisms. Zymergen claims they have the world's largest database of proprietary physical and digital DNA library in the world. The company provides their services to industrial biotechnology customers seeking to improve the cost efficiency of existing strains, or engineer new strains, that manufacture chemicals, food or food additives, and materials using microorganisms.

Partnership, mergers and acquisitions

Radiant Genomics

On January 8, 2018 Zymergen acquired a functional metagenomics research company named Radiant Genomics. With this acquisition Zymergens gets to add the metagenomic technologies and genetic libraries developed by Radiant Genomics to its core platform. Zymergen hopes acquiring Radiant Genomics will help accelerate its ability to identify and create useful organisms and molecules.  The CEO of Zymergen had the following to say about the acquisition: "Radiant has built an unparalleled platform and set of libraries to search genetic diversity that will allow us to search for these molecules of interest, extending our ability to produce useful molecules for materials that can transform the world around us."

Funding

Seed round

On January 1, 2014 Zymergen raised $2,000,000 in seed funding from Genoa Ventures (lead investor), Linden Mobile Ventures, Josh Perfetto, Jesse Robbins, Jenny Rooke, and David Beyer. 

Series A

On June 16, 2015 Zymergen completed their Series A funding round raising $42,000,000 in funding from Data Collective (lead investor), AME Cloud Ventures, DFJ, Genoa Ventures, Two Sigma Ventures, True Ventures, SciFI VC, Obvious Ventures, Innovation Endeavors, and Jenny Rooke. 

Series B

On October 11, 2016 Zymergen completed their Series B funding round raising $130,000,000 in funding from Soft Bank (lead investor), Two Sigma, Tao Capital Partners, Prelude Ventures, Obvious Ventures, Innovation Endeavors, ICONIQ Capital, Data Collective, DFJ, and AME Cloud Ventures.