The Canada Growth Fund (CGF), Ottawa’s $15-billion clean energy investment vehicle, led the round with a US$65-million contribution. Previous investors BMW i Ventures and Bill Gates-backed Breakthrough Energy Ventures also participated. (The Logic)

Talking point: Mangrove will use the funding to support its first commercial-scale lithium refining facility in Delta, B.C., as well as advance development on an Eastern Canadian facility it expects to supply “battery grade” lithium to around 500,000 EVs per year. Its technology uses a modular electro-chemical process that customers can install near lithium sources and at lower cost than alternatives, according to the firm. The CGF is backing Mangrove as the global race to secure domestic supplies of critical minerals intensifies. Last year, federal officials directed the CGF to buy direct stakes in mining firms, weeks after the U.S. Department of Energy acquired its own position in Vancouver’s Lithium Americas.