Struggling fusion power company General Fusion gets $22M lifeline from investors

General Fusion, a Canadian nuclear fusion startup founded in 2002, has secured $22 million in new funding from existing investors to address its financial challenges. Although the company described the funding round as “oversubscribed,” the amount falls significantly short of the $125 million it had sought. This fresh capital, described by Segra Capital’s chief investment officer as the minimum needed to reach the next scientific milestone, will provide limited runway for General Fusion to continue developing its half-scale prototype reactor, Lawson Machine 26 (LM26), which it commissioned earlier this year. General Fusion is pursuing magnetized target fusion, a process where plasma containing heavy hydrogen isotopes is compressed by a liquid lithium wall driven inward by steam pistons to achieve the conditions necessary for fusion. The company aims to reach scientific breakeven—the point where energy output equals energy input—though it did not provide a specific timeline. Interim goals include heating plasma to 10 million and then 100 million degrees Celsius. Given the modest funding