Princeton Critical Minerals (PCM), a clean-technology startup specializing in lithium extraction and brine processing, on Thursday said it successfully raised $16 million in a combined equity and non-dilutive funding round.
The new capital will accelerate the company’s manufacturing expansion, drive commercial deployments in North America and South America, and advance its proprietary technology platform designed to meet surging global demand for critical minerals.
The financing was anchored by an $11 million Series A round led by deep-tech venture firm SOSV. Additional participation came from prominent environmental and strategic investors, including:
- The Grantham Foundation for the Protection of the Environment
- Prospect Innovation
- ASTOR Management AG
- Black Forest Ventures
- New Jersey Economic Development Authority (NJEDA), via the New Jersey Innovation Evergreen Fund
In addition to private equity, PCM secured over $5 million in non-dilutive grant funding from federal and state agencies, including the National Science Foundation, ARPA-E, and the NJEDA.
Spun out of research originating from Princeton University, PCM addresses a major bottleneck in the clean energy transition: the slow speed, high land footprint, and complex processing limits associated with conventional lithium extraction from brine reservoirs.
Rather than requiring entirely new mines or costly greenfield developments, PCM’s modular technology platform is engineered to integrate directly into existing production workflows. Its integrated suite includes:
- Lilypad™: Floating solar-powered evaporation enhancement devices that act as a “second sun” to dramatically accelerate natural evaporation rates.
- SmartPond™: An AI-powered real-time tracking and forecasting layer for optimized pond management.
- E-LiTE™: A selective crystallization and separation technology that efficiently extracts critical minerals from brines and industrial wastewater streams.
“Lithium demand has moved far beyond the demand for electric vehicle (EV) batteries,” Sean Zheng, co-founder and CEO of PCM said. “Battery storage, AI data centers, robotics, drones, and broader electrification are all converging on the same constrained critical mineral supply chain… Our novel technology system results in higher production, with lower cost in a shorter time.”
The funding arrives on the heels of a major operational milestone: the successful industrial-scale deployment of PCM’s Lilypad technology in Chile, home to some of the world’s largest lithium brine reserves. Building on this success, the company is preparing to launch additional pilots in Chile focused on AI process optimization and evaporation enhancement, alongside preparing its first commercial rollouts across the United States.
With global markets prioritizing domestic and allied critical mineral security, PCM is well-positioned to scale its operations from its base in Princeton delivering high-efficiency solutions to major global lithium producers.
