LS9, latest Khosla investment, gets $5M

Biofuel research company LS9, based in Silicon Valley, has landed a $5M Series A round from Flagship Ventures and Khosla Ventures.

LS9 is pursuing industrial applications of synthetic biology to produce biofuels that are compatible with existing fuel distribution and consumer infrastructure.

The company says its products, currently under development, are designed to closely resemble petroleum derived fuels, but be renewable, clean, domestically produced, and cost competitive. In addition to biofuels, LS9 is to also develop industrial biochemicals for specialty applications.

While the company was founded in 2005, it only announced its existence a month ago.

LS9 is commercializing work by its scientific founders Chris Somerville, Director of the Carnegie Institution and Professor of Plant Biology at Stanford University, and George Church, Director of the MIT-Harvard US-Dept. of Energy GTL Center and Professor of Genetics at Harvard.

The company's acting CEO is Doug Cameron, former head of biotechnology research at Cargill.

"New technologies developed at companies like LS9 will transform the energy world as fundamentally as Internet technologies have changed the telecommunications industry," said Vinod Khosla, Managing Partner of Khosla Ventures, this morning in a statement.

LS9 is headquartered in San Carlos, California.