LS9, Inc. Secures $15 Million in Series B Funding

Lightspeed Venture Partners, Flagship Ventures and Khosla Ventures Support

Continued Rapid Growth and Market Leadership

    SAN CARLOS, Calif., Oct. 9 /PRNewswire/ -- LS9, Inc., the Renewable
 Petroleum Company(TM), announces the close of its second round of funding
 with $15 million in new investments. Leading the financing was Lightspeed
 Venture Partners, with additional contributions from existing partners
 Flagship Ventures and Khosla Ventures. The funding will support the
 company's continued talent acquisition and rapid commercialization of
 DesignerBiofuels(TM) products.
     As a principal investor, Peter Nieh, General Partner of Lightspeed
 Venture Partners, will also take a seat on the company's board of
 directors.
     "LS9 is the clear market leader for renewable production of
 hydrocarbons. We are very impressed by their differentiated technology,
 strong intellectual property, and compelling economics," Mr. Nieh said.
 "LS9 will be a valuable addition to our clean energy portfolio, and we look
 forward to working with them to extend their lead with respect to these
 second-generation biofuels," he said.
     "LS9 was the first company to focus on recombinant production of
 hydrocarbon biofuels," said LS9 President Robert Walsh. "Building upon two
 years of R&D success, this financing will allow us to continue to attract
 top talent, begin construction of a pilot facility, commercialize on a
 massive scale and bring DesignerBiofuels(TM) products to market in the next
 two or three years," he said.
     LS9 DesignerBiofuels(TM) products are a family of fuels produced by
 microbes that have been specially engineered via recently developed methods
 of industrial synthetic biology. Starting from raw materials that are
 natural sources of sugar such as sugar cane and cellulosic biomass, these
 renewable fuels stand to fundamentally change the biofuels landscape and
 set the stage for widespread product adoption and petroleum displacement.
 LS9 hydrocarbon biofuels have higher energetic content than ethanol or
 butanol and have fuel properties that are essentially indistinguishable
 from those of gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel.
     About LS9
     LS9, Inc., the Renewable Petroleum Company(TM), is a privately-held
 biotechnology company and the pioneer in the commercial development of
 hydrocarbon biofuels. LS9 is pursuing industrial applications of synthetic
 biology to produce proprietary hydrocarbon biofuels that are compatible
 with existing fuel distribution and consumer infrastructure. LS9's
 patent-pending DesignerBiofuels(TM) products are custom engineered in the
 lab to address immediate market needs for clean energy alternatives to
 petroleum. The company was founded in 2005 by leading scientists along with
 specialized venture capital firms Flagship Ventures and Khosla Ventures.
 LS9 is headquartered in San Carlos, California, in the heart of Silicon
 Valley. http://www.ls9.com.
     About Lightspeed Venture Partners
     The partners of Lightspeed have invested over $800M in more than 100
 technology companies over the past two decades and invests across the U.S.,
 China, India and Israel. Lightspeed has contributed strong operational and
 sector expertise to market leaders such as Blue Nile, Brocade, Ciena,
 eHealthinsurance, Galileo Technology, Informatica, Kiva Software, Metasolv,
 Phone.com, Quantum Effect Devices, Riverbed, Sirocco, Virsa Systems and
 Waveset, working closely with these companies throughout the early stages
 of their business development lifecycles. http://www.lightspeedvp.com
 
 

SOURCE LS9, Inc.