Plant breeding startup Rootility has raised $10 million in Series C funding in a round led by UK-based ADM Capital.
ADM’s Cibus Fund was joined by existing investors GreenSoil Investments, the Israeli agrifood tech fund, and Middleland Capital, the family office-backed agrifood tech VC.
The Israeli startup plans to use the funding to scale its operations and enter new territories including several markets in Asia.
“Over the last several years we have been able to revolutionize rootstock breeding in several crops including industrial and open field-fresh tomatoes,” said Rafael Meissner, founder and chief executive officer of Rootility. “We are excited by the combination of valuable strategic relationships and operational expertise ADM Capital brings.”
Rootility believes roots are the drivers of plants’ tolerance to environmental changes and performance improvements and therefore uses innovative root-focused plant breeding methods to increase crop yields and overall agronomic performance. Its methods are GMO-free and are based on sophisticated simulation and empirical work in combination with well-known breeding techniques. This enables the company to cross and screen crops at a large scale and high speeds.
Rootility has planted a large number of grafted tomato plants in California in an effort to showcase how Rootility tech can improve plant tolerance to temperature and soil born diseases including fusarium, a type of fungus. The company also works closely with leading seed companies and food processors, according to a release.
Rootility has now raised around $40 million in total, its last round a $5 million Series B just over a year ago.
