Colossal Biosciences, which develops technology to reintroduce extinct-species traits into living species, is reportedly in talks to raise new funding at a valuation of $20 billion to $30 billion. Axios reported the news on July 20, 2026, citing people familiar with the matter. The company's previous round, completed in January 2025, valued it at $10.2 billion, meaning the upper end of this new range would represent roughly a threefold increase. The company reportedly had no recorded revenue at the time of its last raise, but now has some revenue—though its scale and sources remain unknown. The question is whether investors are pricing the de-extinction research itself, or a broader, horizontally scalable biotech business.
From $10.2 Billion to Potentially $30 Billion
Colossal's Series C round, announced on January 15, 2025, raised $200 million, bringing its total funding to $435 million and its valuation to $10.2 billion. The round was led by TWG Global, with the company stating the funds would go toward developing genetic engineering technologies. The newly reported range of $20 billion to $30 billion represents 1.96x to 2.94x that $10.2 billion figure. If the reported terms hold, the valuation would nearly double to triple in about 18 months.
However, what can currently be confirmed is only that talks are taking place—not that the funding round has closed. According to Axios, the amount being raised and the lead investor have not been identified, and Colossal did not respond to a request for comment. It's also unclear whether the proposed valuation is pre-money or post-money. If the amount of new capital coming in is substantial, the meaning of a $30 billion figure—in terms of dilution for existing shareholders and the price investors are accepting—would differ accordingly.
A valuation only becomes fixed once investors and terms are settled and the deal closes. For now, the $20 billion to $30 billion range should be treated as a price band the company and investors are exploring.
How Revenue Changes the Investor Calculus
The biggest difference from the previous round, according to Axios's sources, is that Colossal now has revenue—whereas it had none before. If a company once valued without any revenue track record has now progressed to generating revenue, investors gain an additional data point to work with. But the revenue figures and growth rate remain undisclosed. Gross margin, customer count, and whether the revenue comes from recurring contracts or one-time payments tied to research collaborations are all unknown.
Colossal itself doesn't limit its business scope to de-extinction. In its 2025 funding announcement, the company outlined plans to develop software, wetware, and hardware centered on genetic engineering, with applications spanning species conservation and human medicine. The technologies the company is investing in are built on the premise that de-extinction research and applications in other fields can advance on the same shared R&D foundation.
Efforts to spin off technology into separate companies are already underway. Form Bio, spun off in 2022, applies Colossal's multi-species genetic engineering technology to human gene therapeutics. Breaking is a company that applies bioengineering developed at Colossal to plastic degradation. While the existence of these two companies demonstrates that the underlying technology has multiple commercial outlets, their revenue cannot simply be counted as Colossal's revenue, nor can their valuations simply be added to the parent company's. This is because the economic terms—such as equity stakes and licensing income—have not been disclosed.
A Government Partnership Is Not the Same as Revenue
On June 25, 2026, the U.S. Department of the Interior announced that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Colossal had signed a memorandum of understanding to collaborate on biobanking and conservation genomics. The scope involves long-term preservation of tissue and cells from endangered species, and examining methods and data-management standards for incorporating genomic information into conservation planning. While a government agency exploring the technology's applicability expands its potential use cases, the Department of the Interior explicitly states that the MOU does not obligate any federal spending. Any future project involving funding, services, or assets would require a separate contract.
The relationship with the UAE also requires distinguishing capital from revenue. On February 3, 2026, Colossal and the UAE announced plans to establish a permanent research facility—the World Preservation Lab—and a genetic-resource repository called the Colossal BioVault, at the Museum of the Future in Dubai. According to the announcement, the UAE led an early investment expanding Colossal's most recent funding round. This represents capital flowing into the company, not revenue from product or service sales.
Government partnerships give Colossal opportunities to apply conservation technology in real-world settings and refine operational terms. At the same time, public documents don't reveal the scale of any paid contracts or recurring revenue. In assessing whether a valuation above $20 billion is justified, what matters is not the number of partnerships, but how much ongoing compensation the company can reliably extract from them.
What the Next Round Needs to Prove
If this round of talks concludes successfully, it will reveal the terms under which participating investors accepted the valuation—who the lead investor is, how much they invested, and whether the $20 billion to $30 billion figure is pre-money or post-money. Disclosure of these details would allow for an assessment of the price established in this private placement.
The other key factor is the quality of the revenue. Beyond the dollar figure and growth rate, understanding which technologies were sold to whom would clarify whether Colossal should be valued as an R&D company, a technology licensor, or a conservation infrastructure operator. The equity stakes and licensing relationships with Form Bio and Breaking will also affect how much value flows back to the parent company.
Colossal has put de-extinction research at the forefront of its identity, raising $435 million by January 2025. The deal terms and revenue breakdown that eventually become public will serve as the basis for judging whether the company can repeatedly convert genetic engineering into profit—and whether a valuation of $20 billion to $30 billion is warranted.