Funds to Help Company in its Mission to Protect 1% of the Earth and Scale Verifiable Biodiversity Conservation Efforts
FRUTILLAR, Chile, Feb. 22, 2023 — Lemu, creators of a community of nature lovers and stewards of environmental projects throughout the world, today announced it had raised $8 million as part of its Series A funding round.
Lemu links the digital and natural worlds, empowering people to help turn back the tides of the environmental crisis through nature-based solutions with verifiable impacts. The app allows users to support verifiable conservation programs based on a global index called LemuRank which accounts for nature-centric and anthropocentric valuations. Lemu also evaluates conservation efforts by summarizing the evidence for impact due to conservation management through a local index named LemuImpact. This leads to the facilitation of strategies and resources to democratize and scale verifiable, evidence-based conservation.
Arauco Ventures was the sole investor in the round, which brings the total raised by Lemu to $15 million. The funding will be used primarily to extend and iterate the Lemu app, amplify the app’s public launch, grow Lemu’s headcount by 50%, and enhance the development of Lemu’s impact verification methodologies, tools, and algorithms.
“There is tremendous excitement around what Lemu is doing, and with good reason,” said Gianfranco Truffello, Managing Partner of Arauco Ventures. “They are pointing the way towards a new paradigm of conservation that will allow ordinary people to make a real impact in protecting life on our planet. They’re thinking big, and they’re already demonstrating results.”
Lemu’s tools are already being put to significant use at this early stage. This past December saw the first ecosystem adoption happen through Lemu’s app by a user in the US who supported a conservation project reforesting the burnt Magila/Mkussu forest in Tanzania and will start to witness her impact.
“At Lemu, we believe that we all have an essential role to play in fighting the environmental crisis,” said Leo Prieto, founder and CEO of Lemu. “The desire to make a difference is widespread, and our app is giving people the tools they need to do exactly that. Nature-based solutions are the most efficient way to combat biodiversity loss and climate change, and Lemu is developing the tools to guide investment and amplify this impact.”
In the months since the announcement of the Lemu app, the excitement around it has grown significantly: the waiting list has 15,000 users for an app that is still invitation-only. Early users have learned from and connected with 73 conservation projects from 62 stewards in 34 countries throughout the world, representing 5.8 million hectares of protected areas.
Beyond the public launch of the app, many exciting milestones are forthcoming for Lemu, including the finalization of Lemu’s own hyperspectral nanosatellite, Lemu Nge (“Forest Eye“), unique in its kind dedicated to habitat and biodiversity observation, which will be launched by SpaceX in 2024. By the end of 2023, Lemu also plans on financing the first 100,000 hectares of biodiversity protection, the first major milestone on its path to help finance the conservation of 1% of the land surface of the planet by 2033.
For more information, visit Lemu online at le.mu.
About Lemu
Founded by South American Internet pioneer Leo Prieto, Lemu is committed to using technology to harness collective intelligence to improve life for all of Mother Earth’s inhabitants. Lemu encourages users to learn, explore, and support nature, preserving biodiversity and encouraging participation in conservation initiatives. Lemu’s goal is to be responsible for financing the conservation of 1% of planet Earth within the next 10 years.
For more information or to join the Lemu network, visit le.mu.
Contact:
David Parmet
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SOURCE Lemu
