DroneSeed has announced that it has raised $36 million in its Series A funding round. The round was led by Social Capital and Seven Seven Six, with participation from new and existing investors. Part of these funds were used to acquire Silvaseed, a 130-year-old forestry company, to expand DroneSeed’s seed collection and seedling cultivation services.
“Global reforestation is key to our fight against climate change,” said Jay Zaveri, a partner at Social Capital. “We’ve supported DroneSeed from the very beginning given its promise to terraform our planet for good. Since then, DroneSeed has scaled its effort to reforest land, found a profitable model through carbon markets, and transformed the experience of forest development for landowners.”
“DroneSeed is using technology to restore forests faster and help save our planet. Their team’s mission-driven approach is what made this investment and partnership a natural fit for Seven Seven Six,” said Katelin Holloway, Founding Partner at Seven Seven Six who is joining the board as an observer. “DroneSeed has recruited fantastic talent from diverse communities and disciplines, and we are thrilled to support them as they take on an incredibly important global challenge: climate change.”
Along with Social Capital and Seven Seven Six, new investors in this raise include DBL Partners, which was an early investor in Tesla and SpaceX; Tobi Lütke, CEO of Shopify; Resilience Reserve; and Marc Benioff’s TIME Ventures. Existing investor Spero Ventures also participated with Marc Tarpenning, the co-founder of Tesla, continuing his role as a board observer.
