Announcing our $1B Series B Led By Sequoia

Valar Atomics is excited to announce the closing of a $1 billion Series B financing led by Sequoia Capital. As part of this new partnership, Valar welcomes Sequoia partner Shaun Maguire to Valar’s board of directors. Sequoia was joined in this round by Apandion, Atreides Management, Conviction, Dream Ventures, HOF Capital, Point72, Riot Ventures, Snowpoint Ventures, Valor Equity Partners, and other both new and longtime investors. Finally, in addition to the $1B of equity, Valar is excited to announce the closing of a $200 million credit facility led by Erebor Bank, as administrative agent, and J.P. Morgan, alongside Crescent Cove and Hercules Capital. At this point, it is reasonable to ask: what does this news mean for Valar Atomics?

Just three years ago, Valar was born from a simple observation: the world’s most abundant energy source, one which is both environmentally sustainable and efficient in production, suffered from one of the worst cost curves in the industry. Yet somehow, even as predictions mounted of a doubling in energy demand on the horizon, no one was working to fix the cost curve. More than 70 years after the first nuclear reactors were built, traditional nuclear plants required a fortune to fund and decades to build. American supply chains no longer had the strength necessary to build a traditional nuclear plant on a reliable timetable, and skilled labor which built the exquisite designs of the mid-20th century had been lost to decades of offshoring. The status quo was incapable of solving the looming energy crisis at hand.

Valar was founded with the following ethos: to bring manufacturing economics to nuclear through a vertically integrated business model and unwavering prioritization of hardware. In two years, Valar completed its non-nuclear Ward Zero prototype, achieved cold criticality of its NOVA core at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, and was selected by the U.S. Department of Energy for the Nuclear Reactor Pilot Program and Advanced Nuclear Fuel Line Pilot Program. Less than three years after the company’s founding, the completion of the Ward 250 reactor allowed Valar to transition from developing nuclear technology to operating nuclear infrastructure. On June 18, Ward 250 achieved self-sustaining criticality, making Valar Atomics the first company ever to take a nuclear reactor critical outside of a national lab. Just a week later, Ward 250 set another record when, broadcast before a live audience, the reactor generated electricity to power an NVIDIA Blackwell. This marked the first and only time that an advanced reactor has directly powered AI infrastructure, and was the first time in history a startup generated nuclear power. To close out the event, Valar and NVIDIA made one final announcement: a collaboration on a waterless 30 MW AI factory to match Ward 250’s waterless reactor technology.

The preliminary stage of Valar’s mission has been a success. Ward 250’s operability has been proven. More importantly, the speed and efficiency of a vertically integrated, hardware focused approach stands for all to see. So, what does the new Series B financing mean for Valar? It allows us to make the next mission critical evolution: Valar will transition from demonstrating the operability of an integrated reactor system to producing fleets of them en masse. This has been Valar’s mission since its inception. A project can build one reactor, but a fleet requires manufacturing. This series B financing is the fuel for this mission. It will allow us to fully execute a vertically integrated, hardware first approach; one that encompasses everything from reactor deployment and long-term operations to fuel production. Valar will not rely on outside suppliers for the fuel needed to deploy and operate. We will construct it ourselves in labs placed alongside the very reactors that same fuel will run. These reactors will bring unprecedented energy abundance that matches the scale of their production.

With every hour of its operation, Ward 250 generates engineering, manufacturing, and operational data to feed the reactors to follow. The same will go for every reactor that we build, resulting in exponentially simpler production, exponentially faster deployment, and exponentially more reliable operation. The continuous learning loop is the key that will bring manufacturing economics to nuclear power. It took two years to complete the NOVA core. It took seven months to take Ward 250 critical. With each reactor built, the tick rate will become smaller until Valar is producing tens, then hundreds, then thousands of reactors per year. Eventually, factories filled wall to wall with small modular reactors will allow a once unaffordable energy source to approach the cost of production.

This is the path to American energy abundance. Thousands of reactors clustered strategically throughout the nation will take energy prices to lows that were historically inconceivable. The energy surplus will not come at the cost of our environment. It will be carbon free, generated in reactors with no burden on our water supply. It will power the AI infrastructure that will take technology and manufacturing to new heights, and it will power steel production and electrolysis, creating thousands of jobs that were once thought lost and ushering in a new era of industry. And one day, these reactors will transport us throughout the solar system to places that other energy cannot reach. This is the mission that the recent Series B financing makes possible. Valar is proud to welcome new partners to our mission and grateful for the support of friends, both new and old.

Welcome to the Atomic Age.