Is biotech “the next industrial revolution?” The United States Department of Defense appears to think so, as it has injected millions into multiple agrifoodtech startups including The Every Co and Liberation Labs.
And actually, biotech was all over the news this week, from a Danish startup’s fundraise for “next-gen weight loss” to the opening of The Culture Hub, a new biotech mega-facility in Switzerland.
Meanwhile, Toblerone parent company Mondelez is putting more faith into cocoa tech with a second investment in Celleste Bio.
Funding
🇩🇰 €80M Series A fuels Danish biotech company’s next-gen weight loss therapy development Arctic Startup
🇫🇷 Biodiversity startup Darwin secures €1.5M for nature data analysis Tech.eu
🇺🇸 Mondelez sees a future for chocolate in cultured cocoa startup Bloomberg
🇺🇸 AGEYE receives investment from Mann+Hummel Horti Daily
🇬🇧 Food supply chain start-up Cerve lands £3.5m seed funding Sky News
M&A, IPOs & partnerships
🇺🇸 Seaweed innovators Sway and Umaro join forces to optimize alginate for sustainable bioplastics Umaro Foods
🇫🇷 🇮🇹 Syngenta France and xFarm Technologies join forces for crop detection through Geospatial AI xFarm
🇮🇱 🇧🇷 W-Cycle, Melhoramentos join forces to produce compostable food containers Perishable News
Funds, grants & accelerators
🇺🇸 Propagate awarded $24.6 million USDA to advance agroforestry & reforestation for working farms in 5 states Propagate
🇬🇧 🇨🇱 Toesca AM and Astarte launch $350m regenerative ag fund Agri Investor
🇺🇸 DoD injects millions into The Every Co. & other biotechs, says the “next industrial revolution will be a biomanufacturing revolution” Vegconomist
People moves
🇺🇸 Pivot Bio appoints Melih Keyman to board of directors PR Newswire
🇬🇧 Gresham House appoints global director of natural capital Agri Investor
Other news
🇺🇸 Cargill to cut thousands of jobs globally as profits shrink Bloomberg
🇪🇸 Delivery app Glovo bends to Spain’s riders’ law, will hire thousands of couriers TechCrunch
🇬🇧 In a U-Turn, UK court bans use of ‘milk’ on Oatly & other plant-based dairy labels Green Queen
🇸🇪 Mushroom protein pioneer, Ramkumar Nair, to launch a fresh venture Protein Production Technology
🇮🇱 🇹🇭 Aleph Farms submits Thailand’s first cultivated meat application, eyes 2026 market launch Vegconomist
🇺🇸 Court blocks updated USDA regs for genetic engineering Agri Pulse
🇺🇸 Tyson closes 3 meat plants, lays off 1K workers Agriculture Dive
🇺🇸 FDA mulls standard date labels to reduce food waste Food Navigator
🇨🇭 The Cultured Hub opens its state-of-the-art biotech facility in Switzerland BBM
