What’s in a name? How the term ‘AgriFoodTech’ came to be
AgFunderNews head Louisa Burwood-Taylor on the origins of the now much-used term and how the food and ag industries evolved with it.
AgFunderNews head Louisa Burwood-Taylor on the origins of the now much-used term and how the food and ag industries evolved with it.
A spinoff from VTT in Finland, Enifer is targeting human food, petfood, and aquaculture markets with its mycoprotein, produced from a fungal strain first commercialized in the 1970s.
Consumers will look for foods and dietary supplements that naturally mimic the effects of GLP-1 drugs, predicts Bharat Vasan.
MeliBio is rolling out its first products in partnership with Slovenian food maker Narayan in the UK, Switzerland, and Austria in the first part of a $10m deal to reach 75,000 stores across Europe.
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.
Artificial intelligence (AI) is unsurprisingly top of mind but founders also cite new developments in bioinformatics, plant cell culture and continuous fermentation in our festive vox pop.
As well as taking stock of the best read articles of the year, the AgFunderNews team also wanted to highlight our favourite stories of the year; the articles we’re most proud of and enjoyed reporting the most.
To find out, foodtech editor Elaine Watson fired off a few emails to startups she’s covered on AgFunderNews this year to get a sense of what is disrupting their sleep, with a particular emphasis on the alt protein space.
AgFunderNews catches up with two players in this nascent field: Dr. James Petrie at Australian startup Nourish Ingredients, and Dr. Yulin Lu at US startup Yali Bio.
As part of GROW’s 2024 program, which kicks off in April, 10 founders will receive a $100k cash investment from AgFunder, introductions to its global network of co-investors, and mentorship and support from Singapore-based agrifoodtech accelerator, GROW, over a five-month period.
One of a small, but high-profile group of startups attempting to decouple food production from agricultural land, Solar Foods uses carbon dioxide and hydrogen instead of sugars to feed its bacteria.
“We feel good about the relationship with Burger King,” says Impossible Foods CEO Peter McGuinness. “We feel good about our sales, the Impossible Whopper is important to us and it’s important to them, and we are working with them exploring other innovations.”
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.
While the beleaguered plant-based meat company achieved positive free cash flow in the third quarter, it does not expect to sustain it in the fourth quarter.
If you’re mid-way through a pitch and investors still have no idea what your startup actually does, you’ve got a problem, say investors we quizzed this week…
Areas of interest include sustainable packaging, fermentation, agriculture biologicals, crop disease resistance, soil health and regenerative agriculture.
Triplebar’s system enables it to screen millions of mutations and optimize a yeast strain, for example, over many generations at record speed, effectively “running evolution at hyper-speed.”
While many coffee drinkers love the instant boost they get from caffeine, they don’t like the jitters that often come with it, says Rarebird founder Dr. Jeffrey Dietrich.
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International Fresh Produce Association launches year 3 of its produce accelerator