A little more than one year after securing $130M in financing, molecular technology company Zymergen has expanded beyond the Golden State to the Emerald City, Seattle.
A little more than one year after securing $130 million in financing, molecular technology company Zymergen has expanded beyond the Golden State to the Emerald City, Seattle.
Zymergen took over a 4,700 square-foot space in downtown Seattle. The site currently has six employees with space to add another 30 as the company continues its growth. In its announcement, Zymergen said that the opening of a new office signals the company’s intention to grow and hire in that area. The company said it selected Seattle as its secondary home due to the strong presence of software and data science talent. Since it was founded four years ago, Zymergen has grown to more than 350 employees.
On its online jobs portal, Zymergen lists a number of job openings in the Bay Area in multiple company divisions. The company is hiring a number of research associates for a variety of duties, as well as multiple scientist roles in purification and polymer-organic chemistry. The company is also hiring for roles in finance, administration and marketing. There are not yet any positions listed for the Seattle office.
“We’re excited to be strengthening our presence in Seattle,” Zymergen Chief Executive Officer Joshua Hoffman said in a statement. “Zymergen is solving tough, real-world problems, and data science and software engineering are core to our ability to do so. With its strong data science community, existing ecosystem of tech companies, and as the home of the University of Washington, Seattle offers the perfect conditions for us to find the technical talent we need to meet our mission.”
Zymergen works with companies that already have microorganisms they use in manufacturing and chemical production. Zymergen uses robots and its proprietary algorithms to engineer bacteria to manufacture various industrial chemicals. Treating the genome as a search space, Zymergen said it uses proprietary machine learning algorithms and advanced automation to identify genetic changes that can be used both to improve the economics of existing products and to develop wholly new ones. The company’s platform is used for applications that span multiple industries, agriculture, to chemical manufacturing to healthcare. Zymergen counts multiple Fortune 500 companies among its clients.
After securing the $130 million in Series B funding last year, Zymergen said it intended to use those funds to spur growth, including a ramping up of its sales force. The Series B funding was on top of $44 million in Series A the company raised in 2015, as well as $2 million in 2013 seed funding.
