Giraffe Bio, a mining biotechnology startup with operations in Argentina and Chile, has raised a $6.4m seed round to scale up chemicals that help mines pull more copper out of their ore. TechCrunch reported the round on 13 October 2026.
Orion Industrial Ventures, a venture firm that invests in mining, mineral processing and industrial decarbonisation, led the round. BHP Ventures, the investment arm of the mining group BHP, took part alongside Twynam, Air Capital and Baruch Future Ventures. No valuation was disclosed.
The company was founded in 2024 and is run by co-founder and chief executive Alejandro Buffo Sempé, according to Ecosistema Startup. The funding database Fundz lists it as based in Buenos Aires.
“We can leverage all of the biological machinery without having to deal with keeping alive a microbe”Alejandro Buffo Sempé, Co-founder and CEO, Giraffe Bio (to TechCrunch)
What Giraffe Bio does
Most of the world's copper passes through flotation, a step in which crushed ore is mixed with water and reagents so that copper-bearing particles separate from waste rock. The company says flotation underpins about 80% of global copper production. Giraffe Bio makes reagents for that step, designing compounds for the mineral make-up of a particular mine and producing them with engineered microbes grown in bioreactors.
Ecosistema Startup reports that the reagents are developed with AI-driven molecular design and cell-free biology and then tested on real ore samples. They are meant to be added to a plant's existing flotation circuit without new equipment or changes to the plant. Buffo Sempé told TechCrunch that the method uses the microbes' biological machinery without the company having to keep a living organism working inside the mine's process.
The company claims its reagents can raise copper recovery by up to 5%, a gain Buffo Sempé described to TechCrunch as material for a mine. It is also developing so-called depressors, compounds that bind unwanted material such as arsenic, and says its products can replace toxic reagents now used in flotation. Copper is the first target, but the company says the same platform could be aimed at gold and silver.
Who invested
The lead investor, Orion Industrial Ventures, specialises in mining and heavy industry, and the participation of BHP Ventures links the startup to one of the world's largest miners. Twynam, Air Capital and Baruch Future Ventures completed the round. SOSV backed the company before this round, according to Ecosistema Startup, and Fundz also lists it among the investors.
Giraffe Bio was the first Latin American company selected for Breakthrough Energy's Fellows programme, which offers funding, technical support and access to specialists for companies bringing clean technologies to market, Ecosistema Startup reported.
What the money is for
The startup plans to use the funds for larger trials and validation under industrial conditions with mining partners, more research and development, higher production volumes and a larger technical and commercial team. It has not named the mines it is working with, and it has not disclosed its headcount or revenue.
A tight market for copper
TechCrunch notes that copper supply could fall about 25% short of demand by 2040, as AI data centres and the electrification of transport and energy draw on the metal. New supply usually depends on new mines, which take years to build, and only a small fraction of prospective mines ever reach production. Recovering more metal from ore that is already being processed is one way to close part of the gap.
Other startups are applying biology to the same problem. TechCrunch names Endolith, Ceibo and Transition Metal Solutions, which use microbe-based methods on heap leaching, a different extraction route. Giraffe Bio's focus on flotation reagents places it at another stage of the processing chain, where it is betting that mines will pay for chemicals that select copper more precisely.
Company website: giraffe.bio