At a time when many alt protein companies are struggling to raise funds, Infinite Roots (formerly Mushlabs) has netted $58m from investors including German food retail giant (REWE) and the holding company behind Haribo (HRH).
The capital injection will also help advance work to develop Cavendish bananas engineered to resist the devastating fungal disease Fusarium wilt.
MFL combines solid state fermentation technology with an AI-driven computational platform to create clean label savory ingredients that give depth, body, and meaty flavors to plant-based foods.
The startup’s enzymatic technology converts up to 80% of the sugars in juice into dietary fibers and non-digestible sugars without impacting the vitamins, minerals and organic acids in the final product.
Funding in Novel Farming Systems—an AgFunder category spanning indoor farming, insect ag, aquaculture, and algae production—fell off a cliff last year.
A new One Acre Fund program will act as a “resilience shield” for the 97% of smallholder farmers in Africa lacking insurance.
It also teased “a major CPG partner launch” with its whey from fermentation and said it would unveil “new molecules which will bring the impact of precision fermentation to more products and markets.”
Plus… Steakholder Foods unveils a 3D-printed eel, and carbon removal startup Standard Biocarbon secures $5m for a new biochar production facility.
Here are some of highlights (and a few low lights😉) from 2023, plus some areas to watch in 2024, from designer probiotics to livestock methane reduction.
Readers of AgFunderNews were glued to stories on indoor ag, regenerative ag, plant-based and cultivated meat, and an ugly spat between Miyoko’s Creamery and its namesake founder in 2023.
Foodtech + agtech = agrifoodtech. Check out our potted history of one of the world’s most politically charged—and critically important—industries over the last 10 years, with data, analysis, and interviews with Climate Corp, John Deere, FBN, Impossible Foods, Mosa Meat, and more…
Fund II will invest in disruptive consumer brands at seed stage up to Series A, cutting checks of around a million dollars with 25-30% of the fund reserved for follow on investments
Food processing and commodities giant ADM aims to have 4 million acres signed up for regenerative agriculture by 2027.
Invaio and Peptyde Bio will be able to speed up development of and access to reliable, more sustainable crop protection.
Pea milk maker Ripple Foods has raised $49m in a new round according to an SEC filing, taking its cumulative funding to more than $274m.
Fund III will address “problems that transcend time and generation such as water scarcity, the food supply chain, sustainable manufacturing, mobility and energy, and under-represented healthcare.”
Water remains one of the most undervalued and underinvested resources in agrifood innovation despite its intrinsic role in the food system.
Apps helping us find the perfect love match are ubiquitous. But there are precious few online tools to help biotech companies find the perfect contract research organization (CRO), says Cromatic.
The FoodShot Global team looks back on half a decade of agrifoodtech investment and hints at what’s in store for the next five years.
Areas of interest include sustainable packaging, fermentation, agriculture biologicals, crop disease resistance, soil health and regenerative agriculture.
