Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (SMBC) has backed Montreal-based Deep Sky with a strategic investment that will support the development of a carbon dioxide removal (CDR) and direct air capture (DAC) market in Japan.
The two companies originally announced their partnership back in 2025, during the DeCarbon Tokyo 2025 conference, held on December 3-4 in Tokyo.
SMBC is now advancing this collaboration with its first-ever investment in the CDR/DAC sector, which also marks the first funding allocation made under its Social Value Creation Investment Fund. The terms of the investment were not disclosed.
Through this investment, SMBC aims to leverage Deep Sky’s expertise in DAC project development, CO2 storage, and insights on the generation of high-quality carbon removal credits.
The bank also intends to support the sourcing and use of DAC credits, creating opportunities for collaboration with project developers and corporate buyers. This will strengthen the support for its customers’ decarbonization initiatives, and it will contribute to the growth of CDR/DAC in Japan.
Deep Sky and SMBC signed the agreement in Tokyo alongside the Honourable Maninder Sidhu, Canada’s Minister of International Trade, during the Team Canada Trade Mission to Japan.
This partnership highlights the growing strategic importance of a collaboration between Canada and Japan in the fields of clean technology, CO₂ removal, and sustainable economic development.
“SMBC’s partnership with Deep Sky reflects the serious momentum building around durable carbon removal in Asia and the opportunity to strengthen the Japan-Canada carbon removal corridor,” said Deep Sky CEO Alexandra Petre. “Japan is a critical market for DAC. Demand is real, the policy environment is maturing, and the opportunity to build lasting market infrastructure is here.”
Relevant: Deep Sky And Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation To Advance DAC And CDR In Japan
Kenji Irie, Executive Officer and General Manager of the Sustainability Planning Department at SMBC, explained that through this partnership with Deep Sky, the bank seeks to gain insights into market developments, technology deployment, and the evolving landscape of carbon credit generation in the carbon removal sector.
He stated, “This investment represents an important opportunity for SMBC to leverage these learnings to further enhance our support to the carbon removal ecosystem in the future.”
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