Jacob Gronholt Pedersen

COPENHAGEN, (Reuters) –Mineral exploration firm KoBold Metals was backed by Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos. On Thursday, it said that it will begin drilling in Greenland to find critical materials for electric cars.

KoBold uses machine learning and artificial intelligence to find raw materials. The company, operated by Bluejay Mining in London, acquired last year a 51% interest in Disko-Nuussuaq on Greenland’s West Coast.

This joint venture plans to use drones for a magnetic survey in high resolution of the area. It also intends to drill approximately 3,000m this year, to depths between 150-400 metres to locate the metals.

Bluejay Mining chief executive Bo Steensgaard stated that the objective was to find massive nickel,. cobalt, and platinum group metals.

The prices of nickel used in stainless and battery technology more than doubled in April after Russia invaded Ukraine. Western sanctions have been imposed against Moscow. Russia provides about 10% of all the nickel needed by the world.

Steensgaard explained that recent geopolitical events have shown the need for new metals deposits in Western countries.

KoBold is an privately owned company. Its principal investors are Breakthrough Energy Ventures. They fund climate and technology projects and have been backed by Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos of Amazon (NASDAQ.)

Kurt House, CEO of KoBold said that “Fully electrifying global economic is our generation’s greatest challenge.”

He stated, “To achieve that lofty goal, we must accelerate the efforts to locate the key materials necessary for the electric car revolution.”

KoBold has raised $192.5million last month. This money will go towards discovering critical materials.

KoBold’s other investors are Andreessen Horowitz (Silicon Valley Venture Capital Fund), Equinor (Norwegian state-controlled Energy Company) and Ray Dalio, the founder of Bridgewater Associates.