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Agtech Funding Sheet: Valagro raises from Metalmark, Abraaj invests in African fertilizer co

October 20, 2016

Soil and crop technologies led the week with two crop enhancement technologies raising funding in Italy and Africa, while a startup using bioinformatics to give vineyards intel about their crop also closed a round. It wouldn’t be a funding sheet without a food e-commerce deal, or two in this week’s case. Enjoy!

Valagro, an Italian biostimulants and specialty nutrients maker, raised an undisclosed venture round with Metalmark Capital, the NY-based private equity firm with experience in the agribusiness sector.

Thrive Market, the online healthy food and products retailer, completed a $10 million convertible note, according to CrunchBase. The round adds to the $111 million Series B it raised in June of this year; one of the sector’s largest ever. The company counts celebrities such as Demi Moore and John Legend as investors.

Biome Makers, a bioinformatics startup for the wine industry, raised a $2.2 million round with Viking Global Investors, genomics company Illumina’s accelerator, and family offices. The company will be hiring new staff at its San Francisco and Spain locations. Find out more about the company in our exclusive interview on AgFunderNews.

Indorama Fertilizers, the largest urea fertilizer manufacturer in Sub-Saharan Africa, now counts major global private equity firm Abraaj Group as an investor. Abraaj, which is headquartered in Dubai, acquired a minority stake from parent company Indorama Corp. Indorama Fertilizers operates a 1.4 million metric tons per year urea manufacturing facility in Port Harcourt, Nigeria. The company provides fertilizer to Nigeria’s farmers as well as neighboring countries and abroad.

PopChef, a French food ecommerce startup serving freshly-cooked meals with local ingredients, has raised €2.2 million ($2.4 million) in seed funding from a group of individual investors, Jaina Capital and Kima Ventures.

Have funding news? We love to post exclusive funding stories! Get in touch [email protected].

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