Temasek-backed GenZero leads US$32 million Series C fundraising for carbon ratings agency
BeZero Carbon says it will use the infusion of funds to expand its ratings coverage
TEMASEK-BACKED decarbonisation platform GenZero is leading the Series C investment round for carbon ratings agency BeZero Carbon.
A sum of US$32 million was raised, with venture capital fund Japan Airlines & Translink Innovation Fund coming in as new investors.
Existing investors also committed fresh capital. They include other venture capital funds EDF Pulse Ventures, Hitachi Ventures, Illuminate Financial, Molten Ventures, Quantum Innovation Fund, quality-control and compliance-service provider Qima, and financial-services company Intercontinental Exchange.
The carbon ratings agency said in a statement on Thursday (Jan 16) that it would invest the new funds in expanding its ratings coverage to include compliance carbon markets. This would include carbon credits governed under Article 6 of the Paris Agreement, as well as those aligned with an international carbon-offsetting scheme for the aviation sector, known as the Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation (Corsia), said Tommy Ricketts, chief executive officer of BeZero.
The agency will also continue investing in automation, including the application of artificial intelligence techniques, as well as beef up its team of climate and data scientists to deliver ratings, data and risk analytics.
Frederick Teo, chief executive officer of GenZero, said that carbon ratings play a pivotal role in ensuring integrity and transparency in carbon markets by providing independent, standardised assessments of quality.
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“By leveraging data, internal scientific expertise and methodological insights to analyse carbon projects, BeZero’s work will foster greater confidence in carbon markets, and catalyse more capital and demand,” he added.
Carbon markets globally have been hit hard by a series of scandals, which have cast a shadow on their integrity and sent prices of carbon credits and their trading volumes down.
BeZero rates carbon credits on an eight-point scale, on which every increase by a point commands a 40 per cent price premium on average in 2025, said the company in a statement.
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BeZero operates in over 30 countries across six continents, and its ratings are available on more than 40 platforms. It has rated more than 480 carbon credit projects, and has over 100 corporate subscribers globally.
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