US start-up Durin has confirmed a bunch of Silicon Valley and other domestic venture capital firms got behind its US$3.4 million pre-seed private funding, which will enable it to advance work on autonomous exploration drilling hardware and software.
Los Angeles-based Durin founder and CEO Ted Feldmann said New York VC firm 8090 Industries led the round, which also got support from the San Francisco offices of Lux Capital, Day One Ventures and Contrary. Feldmann said Austin, Texas-based Bedrock Fund Management, North Carolina-headquartered Champion Hill Ventures and Peter Thiel-backed, Colorado-based 1517 were also on board.
A separate report on the fund-raise added Silicon Valley VC heavyweight Andreessen Horowitz to the list.
Durin is not Andreessen Horowitz’s first mining and metals tech investment. Most of the others are dipping a toe in the mining pond. Contrary said in its first Tech Trends Report earlier this year electrification of the world’s transport and industrial infrastructure was “producing a new landscape in mineral commodities, pushing up demand across a number of different mineral types”. It said mineral production was stagnating despite growing investment in new exploration. The Contrary report highlighted Chinese dominance of global critical mineral production and the need for new sources of reliable supply in the US and other Western economies.
“The diamond drill rig for mineral exploration was first tested in Minnesota in 1890 and hasn’t seen a fundamental innovation since 1953,” Feldmann said this week.
“We at Durin built a remotely operable drill rig in four months. Our next version will be autonomous. Testing begins in Nevada next week.”
While automated mine production drills are becoming an important part of surface and underground mining cycles, and Sweden’s Epiroc announced a record A$350 million order for autonomous battery and cable electric surface drills in Australia earlier this month, mineral exploration robots are a tougher nut to crack.
Feldmann wants to automate all aspects of an exploration rig, including rod handling, in a staged process. He says there are not enough drillers in the US to enable higher mineral exploration spending to meaningfully improve search results. Experienced drilling labour and expertise are constraints worldwide. Autonomy and AI can be game-changers, Feldmann believes.
He told the TechCrunch news site drilling companies would need people on site in future to monitor drilling, deliver supplies and handle core samples. “What we’re trying to eliminate is a need for there to be guys standing around the rig while it’s operating,” Feldmann said.
