CuspAI closes $100M+ Series A funding for materials discovery platform

UK-based materials discovery startup CuspAI has raised over $100 million in Series A funding co-led by New Enterprise Associates (NEA) and Temasek, with participation from NVentures (NVIDIA's VC arm), Samsung Ventures, Hyundai Motor Group, and returning investors, as the Cambridge company scales its AI platform for breakthrough materials development.

Founded in 2024 by co-founders CEO Chad Edwards and CTO Max Welling, CuspAI operates as an AI search engine for materials that enables customers to specify exact material properties and generates new, synthesizable candidates up to 10x faster than traditional methods. The platform combines generative AI models with physics-based simulations to discover materials for industrial and climate applications.

The company has secured strategic partnerships across multiple sectors within its first year, including collaborations with Hyundai for sustainable energy applications, Kemira for PFAS removal from water, and Meta for carbon capture technology. Today, CuspAI's advisory board includes AI luminaries Geoffrey Hinton and Yann LeCun, alongside materials science experts and business leaders Martin van den Brink (former ASML President/CTO) and Lord John Browne (former BP CEO). The company emerged from stealth with a $30 million seed round.

The funding will support scaling operations in the US and Asia, platform development, and accelerating delivery of next-generation materials to market. With climate technology, semiconductors, and sustainable manufacturing requiring materials breakthroughs, CuspAI aims to compress discovery timelines from years to months.

Founders: Chad Edwards & Max Welling

Source: Crunchbase, Medium, CuspAI