Commercial Co-Founder in Residence: Zero-Emissions Steel Venture

Join us as a commercial co-founder for an early stage zero-emission steel venture. The role will be full-time, with a start date in Q1 2025. Applications from those wishing to work part-time as a technical advisor are also encouraged.

We are seeking applications from experienced industry or start-up deep tech development professionals from anywhere in the world to work with us on this venture.

You’ll work closely with the DSV team and the current technical founder in residence for this area to spin-out a new company by the end of Q2 2025.

The Opportunity Area: Zero Emission Steel

Ancient and remarkably versatile, 2 billion tonnes of steel is manufactured a year, requiring some of humanity's most complex engineering. It makes up critical parts of our buildings, cars, ships, machinery, factories, bridges, appliances and more. Meanwhile, producing it from raw iron ore burns 1 billion tonnes of coal, emitting around 3.5 billion tonnes of CO2 into our atmosphere each year. An equivalent sum of CO2 to all the exhaust fumes of every flight on Earth, four times over.

Efforts to recycle steel using Electric Arc Furnaces will help reduce demand for primary (virgin) steel, yet they will be unable to reduce it to zero because (i) scrap supply currently outstrips steel demand, with a projected shortfall of 50% in 2050, (ii) impurity accumulation in scrap means electric arc furnaces are unable to reliably produce high-grade steel. To bridge this supply gap and dilute impurity contents therefore, green primary iron feedstocks are required, alongside recycled feedstocks, into the future.

Bringing the CO2 emissions from steel to zero is essential for limiting climate change. To do this, we are working on a venture for novel primary ironmaking to produce high purity primary iron.

Our Approach

At DSV, we work backwards from the desired outcomes: a steel plant that is capable of producing net-zero primary iron or steel.

By generating an outcomes graph, we’ve identified key constraints in iron making (e.g. incompatibility of poor quality iron ores with emerging ironmaking technologies, plant infrastructure degradation, and high economic exposure to fluctuating hydrogen costs). Through ideation and consultation with external experts, we are approaching one main technology theme: electrolysis of iron ores. 

The precise techstack and its technoeconomics requires further refinement and external validation. The founding team is seeking individuals with commercial expertise in steel to advise or co-found.

What will the role look like for an advisor or co-founder

As a technical advisor you will provide commercial and technical expertise to support customer validation and techno economic assessment for advancing novel steelmaking approaches, incl. (but not limited to):

• Input to techno economic analysis;
• Supporting on customer validation to ensure customer requirements are met by the novel solution;
• Discussing potential commercial risks to success from your experience with the industry to date.

As a commercial co-founder your role will go beyond techno-commercial alignment to include commercial strategy i.e.:

• Driving customer discovery, engaging with industrial stakeholders to build relations, and ensure solutions meet real-world needs and are scalable;
• Developing the technology roadmap and assessing readiness of various concepts from prototype to demonstration phase;
• Engaging with and converting early-stage investors/VCs, ensuring the company is well-positioned for pre-seed to Series A milestones.

Requirements

Who Should Apply

Must haves:

• Experience in building and scaling a high-growth enterprise (leadership/c-suite roles);
• Experience in building and scaling new technologies from concept to demonstration;
• Experience in raising funds from early stage investors/VC;
• Broad knowledge in steelmaking technologies and processes.

Highly desirable: 

• Industry-specific know-how, commercial knowledge (e.g. strategic partnerships, manufacturing, procurement etc.) and network within the steel industry and related industries;
• In-depth knowledge of state-of-the-art (SOTA) technologies and constraints in at least one of the following areas: metals processing technologies such as smelting of metals, electric arc furnaces, thermal or electrolysis processing of metal oxides, ore beneficiation and hydrometallurgy.

Benefits

By joining DSV, you will be part of a team of operators who have founded companies and led the translation of science at some of the most respected universities, charities, funds, and government agencies. Here’s what we offer:

• Access to optimised, purpose-built, proprietary tools, resources, and processes to help create high-impact ventures from scratch;
• Opportunity area-specific know-how from our network of Partners and Advisors;.
• Up to £250k in investment to incorporate the new venture and develop early proof-of-concept data;
• Guaranteed income of £4,166 per month paid as a fixed consultancy fee until the company is launched and the pre-seed investment is secured;
• Majority equity stake in the new company between you and your co-founders;
• Continuous post-spinout support, including fundraising, commercial partnerships, recruitment, and team-building;
• Collaborative support from dozens of Founders currently at DSV across sectors.

The technical advisor offer can be agreed on a case-by-case basis. 

Climate change affects everyone, but engineering and technology are not diverse enough. We strongly encourage women, people of colour, LGBTQIA+, veterans, parents, and individuals with disabilities to apply. 

About DSV

Deep Science Ventures (DSV) is on a mission to create a future in which both humans and the planet can thrive. We use our unique venture creation process to create, spin-out, and invest in science companies, combining available scientific knowledge and founder-type scientists into high-impact ventures. Operating in four sectors—Pharmaceuticals, Climate, Agriculture, and Computation—we tackle the challenges defining these areas by taking a first principles approach and partnering with leading institutions.