Seven Seven Six founding partner Katelin Holloway said helium-3 harvested from lunar dust could generate returns for investors within a decade.
She described Interlune as the first company to sell an off-planet resource back to Earth. "And wow. I mean, it really, really, really is crazy, but I think that it doesn’t look the same as, you know, talking about IRR in a software model," Holloway said on TechCrunch's "StrictlyVC Download" podcast.
$18 Million Bet On Lunar Helium-3
Seven Seven Six led Interlune’s $18 million seed funding round, Interlune said in a statement in March 2024. The Seattle-based startup, founded by former Blue Origin President Rob Meyerson, aims to extract helium-3 from lunar regolith, the dust covering the moon’s surface.
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“They have a very ambitious, long term vision that fits exactly at that intersection of climate tech and space tech,” Holloway said.
The rare isotope sells for approximately $20 million per kilogram on Earth and has applications in quantum computing, medical imaging, and national security.
"They are collecting and harvesting, almost like sifting soil to release and capture this gas that comes from breaking up that regolith, capturing it, and then sending it back to Earth," Holloway told TechCrunch.
Interlune has secured commercial contracts, including agreements with Maybell Quantum Industries and the U.S. Department of Energy, with deliveries scheduled between 2029 and 2035, the company said in May.
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Ten-Year Return Timeline
Despite space investments traditionally requiring longer time horizons, Holloway said Seven Seven Six maintains its standard fund model for the Interlune investment.
"We would not have underwritten this investment if we did not think we could not only make our money back, but actually create outsized returns with this investment within 10 years," she told TechCrunch.
Founded in 2020 with Reddit (NYSE:RDDT) co-founder Alexis Ohanian, Seven Seven Six has raised over $1 billion across three funds.
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Exit Strategy Considerations
“The exit path is not going to look like a typical SaaS company,” Holloway told TechCrunch, calling Interlune a deep tech strategic asset with potential outcomes including acquisitions by aerospace, defense or energy companies, government buyouts, or an eventual IPO.
"But I could see there being a pretty big and significant bidding war, just simply for supply security," she said. "It’s strategic control, just like oil or anything else."
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