Ascension raises £1.7M seed to mine critical minerals from volcanic rock

Oxford University spinout Ascension has raised £1.7 million in a seed round to advance its underground extraction technology for rare earth elements and other critical minerals, in a deal led by UKI2S and including a £670,490 Innovate UK Growth Catalyst grant.

Demand for rare earth elements is rising sharply on the back of electric vehicles, wind turbines, semiconductors and defence systems, but the global supply base is concentrated in a small number of regions and reliant on energy-intensive surface mining. The result is a supply chain that is both environmentally damaging and geopolitically fragile — a problem European and US policymakers have been increasingly vocal about.

Ascension's approach is to leave the rock where it is. Its Selective Recovery programme uses naturally occurring geothermal heat and environmentally safer lixiviants to dissolve and extract metals directly from volcanic glass deposits underground, removing the need for excavation, milling and high-temperature processing. The platform combines geological mapping, geophysical surveying, reservoir modelling and lixiviant optimisation, drawing on research led by Professor Jon Blundy and Professor Mike Kendall at Oxford. The new funding will take the technology towards field trials.

Founded in 2024 and based in Oxford, Ascension is led by Co-Founder and CEO Motoaki Sumi, a former Entrepreneur in Residence at Oxford Science Enterprises whose career also includes operating roles at Arrival, Bloom Energy and Mitsubishi Corporation. The company has now raised £6.2 million in total, and was named earlier this year on Sifted's list of 16 European hardware startups to watch.

The £1.7 million round combines £1 million in matched investment from UK Innovation & Science Seed Fund (UKI2S, managed by Future Planet Capital) with the Innovate UK grant and co-investment from Oxford Science Enterprises and East X. UKI2S Investment Director Shruti Iyengar said the firm backed the company because the underlying science is novel and the team brings depth across both frontier geoscience and commercial execution. The proceeds will support the move to field validation and continued development of the recovery platform.

Sources

• Soapbox: Ascension secures £1.7m in funding from UKI2S and Innovate UK
• Mining.com: Oxford spinout raises $2.3M for deep-underground critical minerals tech
• Global Mining Review: Mining without mines — Oxford spinout advances geothermal critical mineral recovery
• Startup Magazine: Ascension lands £1.7m seed to trial geothermal leaching for critical minerals
• Mining Technology: Ascension secures funding for geothermal critical mineral recovery