Kofi Asante is on a mission to \u201cdemocratize access to clean energy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Asante founded his first startup while attending Tufts University from 2013 to 2017. After college, Asante joined Uber,<\/a> where he worked on the launch team for its freight strategy. Asante told AFROTECH\u2122 that the lessons he learned there informed the launch of Powerloop within Uber, which he credits with giving him an understanding of \u201crapidly scaling companies.\u201d<\/p>\n He went on to become an intrapreneur twice more. He served on the autonomous hybrid electric aircraft launch team of aerospace company Elroy Air, a company with an estimated $1 billion valuation,<\/a> Reuters reports.<\/a> He then served at Arc on the commercial electric ship launch team, with both ventures overlapping with him working as a venture partner<\/a> at Rackhouse Venture Capital.<\/p>\n \u201cI have had the opportunity<\/a> to be a venture partner while I have been an operator, which gave me a well-rounded perspective about the process. I would have some days where I am pitching a venture firm in the morning and being pitched to by a company the same day,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n Bluecore Energy<\/p>\n In 2026, Asante launched Bluecore Energy, a venture-backed nuclear company headquartered at the Port of Long Beach in California. Asante said the company\u2019s inception was inspired by time he spent working with the port\u2019s leadership<\/a> on zero-emission infrastructure and ships, leading him to develop a mission centered on expanding access to clean, reliable energy.<\/p>\n \u201cThey are one of the largest ports in the U.S., very innovative, and want to be the greenest port in the world \u2026 My wife is a pediatrician,<\/a> and we talk daily about the impact of clean air on the children and communities around, so when I found a way to solve for it, the decision was easy,\u201d Asante explained.\u00a0<\/p>\n Asante quit his job in January to bet on Bluecore Energy, which is developing small, modular, water-cooled nuclear power reactors to operate \u201caboard floating energy barges and deliver reliable, zero-emission power directly to ports, critical infrastructure, and cargo ship propulsion,\u201d according to a press release shared with AFROTECH\u2122.<\/p>\n \u201cTraditionally, getting more electricity at scale can take many years: rather than waiting years for new power infrastructure to reach the point of demand, our floating nuclear power plant is designed to bring the power source directly to it in the matter of days,\u201d Asante said. \u201cOur initial system is being developed to power the equivalent of approximately 15,000 homes or scale to meet the power needs of a major port. Designed to be fueled once for years of operation, the reactor can be paired together for scale to provide a new power source for ports, utilities, data centers, offshore infrastructure, and communities facing energy constraints. When a community needs clean energy, we don\u2019t want them to wait for years. We want to deliver it as fast as an Amazon order.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n According to Asante, Bluecore Energy\u2019s team includes SpaceX engineers, former Toyota manufacturers, Black nuclear engineers<\/a>, Black Ivy League PhDs from Blue Origin, and the first woman to serve as a nuclear submarine officer.<\/p>\n \u201cInclusivity, safety, humility, and pragmatism are our Bluecore Values that we all align on even though everyone might have different backgrounds, and it has resulted in an insane amount of progress in only a couple of months of starting the company. Like Black Panther, I want to build a Wakanda, only instead of vibranium, it is uranium, and open up the door for more of the community to build generation-defining companies,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Funding<\/p>\n Bluecore Energy has raised $10 million in an oversubscribed pre-seed round of financing led by Slauson & Co., Ripple co-founder Chris Larsen, Kevin Hart-founded Hartbeat Ventures,<\/a> Harlem Capital, Precursor Ventures, LMNT, Visible Hands VC, Karman Ventures, Capital Factory, Share VC, X&, Markham Ventures, and angel investors<\/a> who are former leaders at Tesla, Uber, Amazon, and Google, per the release shared with AFROTECH\u2122.<\/p>\n The organization intentionally included a significant number of Black-owned and Black-led venture capital firms.<\/p>\n \u201cI believe that the best companies are built by people who can see the world differently \u2026 As the company grows, we can return publicity, capital, and hope to communities that traditionally are not represented in deep tech,\u201d Asante mentioned in the release. \u201cThey have been supportive either as investors in my previous companies or sounding boards when I was building. They have been able to see me build in ground transportation, aerospace, maritime, and now nuclear.\u201d<\/p>\n