Crusoe Raises $1.375 Billion In Series E Funding Round

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Crusoe raised $1.375 billion in its oversubscribed Series E funding round, pushing its valuation above $10 billion for the first time. The round was co-led by Valor Equity Partners and Mubadala Capital, attracting over 30 investors including NVIDIA, Founders Fund, Fidelity Management & Research Company, and Philadelphia Eagles running back Saquon Barkley.

Crusoe, a Denver-based AI infrastructure provider founded in 2018, specializes in energy-efficient data centers and cloud platforms powered by renewable sources like wind, solar, and natural gas with carbon capture. The Series E round reflects explosive growth in the AI sector, where compute and energy bottlenecks are key constraints. CEO Chase Lochmiller emphasized the funding’s role in “activating energy for intelligence” to fuel AI breakthroughs.

Investors and Strategic Backing: The diverse investor base underscores Crusoe’s appeal across tech, finance, and climate-focused funds. NVIDIA’s involvement highlights hardware synergies, while celebrity backer Saquon Barkley adds high-profile endorsement. Mubadala Capital, Abu Dhabi’s sovereign wealth arm, signals global ambitions.

Use of Funds: Proceeds target scaling Crusoe’s “vertically integrated” model—from energy sourcing to AI-optimized data centers—aiming to meet customer needs for gigawatt-scale facilities. Recent milestones, like a 4x power pipeline growth to 45 GW and 5x cloud bookings in 2025’s first three quarters, will be amplified.

Market Context: In a year of AI hype, Crusoe’s raise aligns with peers like CoreWeave ($7.5B valuation) but differentiates via sustainability. The round’s size rivals mega-deals, positioning Crusoe to capture a slice of the $100B+ AI infrastructure market by 2030.

Crusoe’s latest Series E funding round represents a pivotal moment for the AI infrastructure landscape, solidifying the company’s position as a leader in sustainable, high-performance compute solutions. This oversubscribed raise of $1.375 billion catapults Crusoe’s valuation beyond $10 billion, a stark evolution from its origins as a cryptocurrency mining firm pivoting to AI.

Funding Breakdown and Valuation Dynamics

At its core, the Series E is structured as an initial closing of $1.375 billion, with expectations of further inflows from committed participants like funds managed by Blue Owl. This brings Crusoe’s post-money valuation to over $10 billion, a more than 3.5x increase from the $2.8 billion mark set by its $600 million Series D in December 2024. The oversubscription—driven by intense AI demand—highlights investor confidence in Crusoe’s ability to deliver at scale.

To contextualize, Crusoe’s funding trajectory has accelerated dramatically:

Note: Total funding exceeds $4 billion across 12+ rounds, including debt facilities. This table illustrates Crusoe’s maturation from a niche energy startup to an AI powerhouse, with equity rounds comprising the bulk of recent capital.

The valuation jump is not anomalous in the frothy AI market, where multiples for infrastructure plays have soared amid OpenAI and Anthropic’s compute hunger. However, Crusoe’s 81% cost savings claim over traditional clouds—via efficient, energy-aligned designs—provides a defensible moat.

Investor Landscape: A Coalition of Titans

The round’s co-leads, Valor Equity Partners (a Chicago-based growth firm with deep tech ties) and Mubadala Capital (Abu Dhabi’s $300B+ sovereign vehicle), anchor a syndicate blending AI evangelists, climate investors, and blue-chip names. Over 30 entities participated, a testament to broad appeal:

• Tech and AI Heavyweights: NVIDIA (strategic hardware partner), Founders Fund (Peter Thiel’s firm, early backer), Salesforce Ventures, Radical Ventures, and Supermicro (server maker).
• Financial Powerhouses: Fidelity Management & Research, T. Rowe Price, Tiger Global Management, StepStone Group, Franklin Templeton, Atreides Management, and Ribbit Capital.
• Climate and Impact Funds: Lowercarbon Capital, MCJ (climate collective), 1789 Capital, Activate Capital, and Galvanize Climate Solutions.
• Notable Others: NFL star Saquon Barkley (personal investment, aligning with his portfolio in Anthropic and Neuralink); Winklevoss Capital (crypto ties); DPR Construction (infrastructure expertise); and emerging VCs like 137 Ventures, Long Journey Ventures, M37 Management, Spark Capital, Upper90, Zigg Capital, BAM Elevate, Altimeter Capital, and Ora Global.

Barkley’s entry, while modest in size, amplifies visibility— the Eagles running back, who invests endorsement earnings into tech, personally vets founders, echoing Thiel’s influence via Founders Fund. NVIDIA’s stake reinforces ecosystem integration, as Crusoe deploys their GB200 NVL72 and HGX B200 GPUs alongside AMD’s MI300X and MI355X. This roster not only provides capital but unlocks partnerships: Mubadala for Middle East expansion, NVIDIA for GPU access, and climate funds for ESG validation.

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Strategic Use of Proceeds and Operational Momentum

Crusoe’s CEO and co-founder Chase Lochmiller framed the raise as fuel for “AI driven abundance,” targeting bottlenecks in energy and compute. Primary allocations include:

• Infrastructure Scaling: Expanding the 45 GW power pipeline (up 4x YTD 2025) via deals with Tallgrass, Redwood Materials, and Lancium. This powers gigawatt-scale campuses, like the 1.2 GW Abilene, Texas site (live in one year) and a 1.8 GW Wyoming project.
• Cloud Acceleration: Crusoe Cloud, with 5x bookings growth in Q1–Q3 2025, earns “Gold” in SemiAnalysis’ GPU ratings for 99.98% uptime. Partnerships with NVIDIA and AMD enable managed AI services; recent Atero acquisition boosts GPU optimization.
• Global Footprint: New capacity in Norway and Iceland for low-latency Europe; offices in Dublin, Sunnyvale, and Tel Aviv.
• Pivots and Focus: Divestiture of Bitcoin mining to NYDIG sharpens AI exclusivity, freeing resources for inference and training workloads serving clients like Cursor, Decart, Fireworks, Odyssey, Together AI, Windsurf, Playground, Pixelcut, and Boson AI.

Testimonials underscore reliability: Windsurf’s CEO noted “99.98% cluster uptime,” while Odyssey’s praised “robust infrastructure for hundreds of thousands of users.”

Company Background and Differentiators

Founded in 2018 by Lochmiller and Cully Cavness (ex-SpaceX, Palantir), Crusoe began mitigating oil-field gas flaring with mobile data centers—a crypto mining play that evolved into AI amid 2022’s efficiency crunch. Today, it offers:

• IaaS/PaaS: AI cloud with NVIDIA/AMD GPUs, up to 20x faster than incumbents.
• Data Centers: Modular, scalable builds aligned with renewables (wind, solar, hydro, geothermal, natural gas + carbon capture).
• Energy Innovation: Microgrids and digital flare mitigation for net-zero ops.

This “energy-first” ethos addresses AI’s voracious power needs—projected at 8% of U.S. electricity by 2030—while competitors like AWS grapple with emissions scrutiny.

Broader Implications and Market Positioning

The raise cements Crusoe’s rivalry with CoreWeave and Lambda Labs, but its sustainability edge (e.g., carbon-captured natural gas) appeals to regulated enterprises. In a market where AI capex hit $200B in 2025, Crusoe’s vertical integration—controlling 100% of the stack—yields margins hyperscalers envy. Risks include execution on GW-scale builds amid supply chain woes and regulatory hurdles for energy sourcing.

Investor diversity mitigates sector volatility: Climate funds hedge greenwashing claims, while NVIDIA ties ensure tech primacy. For stakeholders, this signals Crusoe’s IPO readiness, potentially in 2027, valuing it akin to Snowflake’s debut.

With $1.375B war chest, Crusoe eyes 100 GW+ pipelines by 2027, deeper NVIDIA integrations (e.g., Blackwell GPUs), and Asia/Europe penetration. Lochmiller’s vision—”helping innovators build faster”—positions Crusoe not just as a provider, but an enabler of AI abundance, from drug discovery to climate modeling. As AI evolves, Crusoe’s clean-energy bet could define winners in the “factory” era.

This Series E is more than capital—it’s validation of a model blending grit, green tech, and GPU muscle, propelling Crusoe toward trillion-dollar AI frontiers.

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