| Date | Title | Description |
| 01.10.2024 | Brief: Agrospheres lands additional Series B funding to ‘take a giant leap forward’ in bringing biopesticides to market | Crop protection solutions provider AgroSpheres has made a final close of its Series B fundraise, bringing total Series B funding to $37 million.
Zebra Impact Ventures led this latest round through its Regenerative Growth I strategy run in p... |
| 11.09.2024 | SOLASTA Bio: A New Dawn for Sustainable Agriculture | In the world of agriculture, the battle against pests is relentless. Farmers wield traditional insecticides like swords, but these weapons are losing their edge. Resistance is rising, and the environmental toll is becoming too heavy to bear... |
| 11.09.2024 | SOLASATA Bio raises $14m, plans to commercialize peptide-based biopesticides in ‘half the time’ it takes for synthetics | UK-based ag biotech startup SOLASTA Bio has closed a $14 million oversubscribed Series A round, bringing its total funding to $19 million.
Forbion (via its Bioeconomy fund), FMC Ventures, and Corteva (through its recently launched Corteva C... |
| 21.03.2024 | Biological progress or bathtub brews? The state of US crop biologicals in 2024 | Bathtub brew. Snake oil. Bugs in a jug. For years, companies developing biologicals — a form of crop protection derived from naturally occurring substances like microbes, peptides, and plants — have labored under the shadow of these labels,... |
| 04.12.2023 | With a fresh $25m in hand, AgroSpheres aims to build ‘unprecedented stability’ in crop biologicals | While generally seen as safer for planetary health, biopesticides are frequently less effective than their synthetic counterparts, with success rates varying wildly. It’s one reason many growers remain hesitant to adopt this class of crop p... |
| 21.08.2023 | Cultivated beef co Omeat begins generating revenues… but not from meat | Cultivated meat startup Omeat—which uses nutrients harvested from the plasma of “healthy, living cows” in its cell culture media—has started generating revenues by selling these nutrients to other companies in a serum called ‘Plenty.’
Bille... |
| 22.06.2023 | Omeat emerges from stealth armed with $40m to scale novel approach to cultivated meat production | Armed with $40 million in funding, Los Angeles-based startup Omeat has emerged from stealth with a “simple and elegant solution” to scaling cultivated meat production involving the humane extraction of growth factors and other components fr... |
| 16.06.2023 | Meet the founder: Bond Pet Foods’ Rich Kelleman on pet parents, pivots, and ‘de-risking’ alt protein | A former ad exec who began to question the ethics of industrialized meat production after doing some strategy work for Burger King, Bond Pet Foods founder and CEO Rich Kelleman is not your average tech bro.
“My background is in advertising,... |
| 08.05.2023 | DIGIT Deal Roundup | April 2023 | Welcome to the latest edition of the DIGIT Deal Roundup column, featuring some of the top investment, acquisition and expansion news stories from February, 2023.
Scotland’s digital technology sector saw a number of notable deals across the ... |
| 11.04.2023 | Scottish Agritech Secures £4M for Eco-Friendly Insecticides | Scottish agritech, SOLASTA Bio, who specialises in the next generation of green insecticides has secured a further round of investment, totalling £4 million to scale up the development of its nature-inspired pesticides.
Investment in this p... |
| 07.12.2022 | BREAKING: Sound Agriculture lands $75m to expand nitrogen enhancing product overseas | US-based Sound Agriculture has raised a $75 million Series D to expand its crop nutrient and plant breeding businesses. New investors BMO Impact Investment Fund and Chan Zuckerberg Initiative led the round. FootPrint Coalition and returning... |
| 29.11.2022 | Verdant Robotics lands $46.5m in fresh funding from Cleveland Avenue, AgFunder & others | US-based Verdant Robotics has closed a $46.5 million Series A for its “Robotics as a Service” technology that combines crop applications with data analytics for farmers. Cleveland Avenue led the round joined by DCVC Bio, Future Ventures and... |
| 14.11.2022 | Brief: Vow lands $49.2m ahead of its cultivated quail launch in Singapore restaurants | Australian cultivated meat company Vow has secured $49.2 million in Series A funding to bring cultivated quail to Singapore.
PeakBridge participated in the round alongside Blackbird, Prosperity7 Ventures, Toyota Ventures, Square Peg, Grok V... |
| 01.06.2022 | BREAKING: FarmWise’s weeding robots haul in $45m Series B funding from Taylor Farms, others | US ag automation startup FarmWise Labs, which builds weeding robot Titan, has raised $45 million in Series B funding, it announced today.
Fall Line Capital and Middleland Capital co-led the round.
Taylor Farms, one of the top producers of l... |
| 19.05.2022 | The Week in Agrifoodtech: Downey Jr’s Footprint backs Motif; Unilever joins $1bn regen ag fund | One of India’s leading food and restaurant delivery services made another big-ticket acquisition this week, while alt-protein producers raised several early-stage rounds. Upstream, Unilever joined a new $1.06 billion fund to accelerate adop... |
| 16.05.2022 | BREAKING: Vestaron banks $82m Series C funding for its crop-protecting peptides | US biotech startup Vestaron, which is devleoping biological alternatives to chemical-based crop controls using peptides, has raised $82 million in its Series C funding round.
Private investment officer Ordway Selections and Cavallo Ventures... |
| 31.03.2022 | The Week in Agrifoodtech: Beewise closes $80m round, Arzeda nabs $33m | This week, Israeli bee tech company Beewise raised funds to save the world’s apine population with robotic hives, while US autonomous greenhouse tech provider Koidra closed its seed round. In alternative protein, US-based companies closed r... |
| 22.02.2022 | Verdant Robotics unveils ‘multi-action’ tech for specialty crops that handles spraying, weeding & more | Disclosure: AFN’s parent company, AgFunder, is an investor in Verdant Robotics.
Verdant Robotics has officially launched its platform that combines data analytics and crop applications such as spraying and weeding into a single farming impl... |
| 16.11.2021 | BREAKING: Chinese VC Bits x Bites hits $100m final close with capital from Syngenta, Wilbur-Ellis | Chinese agrifoodtech VC firm Bits x Bites has closed its latest fund on $100 million with a string of food and ag corporates as well as investment players signing up as LPs.
Among those participating in the fund’s final close were Syngenta ... |
| 16.11.2021 | Chinese VC Bits x Bites hits $100m final close with capital from Syngenta, Wilbur-Ellis | Chinese agrifoodtech VC firm Bits x Bites has closed its latest fund on $100 million with a string of food and ag corporates as well as investment players signing up as LPs.
Among those participating in the fund’s final close were Syngenta ... |
| 22.09.2021 | The Week in Agrifoodtech: Cargill, Heineken & Nestlé unveil regenerative ag programs | In the past seven days, a trio of major agrifood corporates doubled-down on sustainability by announcing new regenerative ag schemes.
Meanwhile, Ford and Walmart said they are partnering on autonomous food delivery tech; and Indigo made the... |
| 14.09.2021 | BREAKING: Nitrogen fixer Andes scores $15m from Bayer, Wilbur-Ellis to move into carbon capture | Andes, a Chilean-founded, US-based ag biotech startup, has raised $15 million in Series A funding. The round was co-led by the VC arms of Bayer and Wilbur-Ellis – Leaps by Bayer and Cavallo Ventures.
Existing investors Endurance and KdT Ven... |
| 14.09.2021 | Nitrogen fixer Andes scores $15m from Bayer, Wilbur-Ellis to move into carbon capture | Andes, a Chilean-founded, US-based ag biotech startup, has raised $15 million in Series A funding. The round was co-led by the VC arms of Bayer and Wilbur-Ellis – Leaps by Bayer and Cavallo Ventures.
Existing investors Endurance and KdT Ven... |
| 25.08.2021 | Agrifoodtech Digest: Cargill, Microsoft & Rabobank get in on the ag carbon game | Two of the past week’s biggest stories were AFN exclusives from the ag carbon market, both involving Microsoft: verification platform Regrow’s $17 million Series A round, and agroforestry startup reNature’s successful ‘harvest’ in Brazil. I... |
| 19.08.2021 | Sound Agriculture closes $45m late stage round | Sound Agriculture, the self-described “bio-inspired” crop inputs company, has raised $45 million in a Series C-extension round led by Bayer‘s investment arm Leaps by Bayer. Life sciences investor Northpond Ventures also joined the round as ... |
| 19.08.2021 | BREAKING: Sound Agriculture closes $45m late stage round led by Leaps by Bayer | Sound Agriculture, the self-described “bio-inspired” crop inputs company, has raised $45 million in a Series D round led by Bayer‘s investment arm Leaps by Bayer. Life sciences investor Northpond Ventures also joined the round as a new back... |
| 19.08.2021 | Sound Agriculture closes $45m late stage round led by Leaps by Bayer | Sound Agriculture, the self-described “bio-inspired” crop inputs company, has raised $45 million in a Series C-extension round led by Bayer‘s investment arm Leaps by Bayer. Life sciences investor Northpond Ventures also joined the round as ... |
| 02.03.2021 | BREAKING: Anti-mastitis startup SomaDetect raises $6m Series A from Ag Capital Canada, Merck | Dairy farmers would save a lot of money — and tears over spilled milk — if they had a way to detect mastitis early.
The bacterial infection of the udders leads to a loss of roughly $200 per cow, per year for US dairy farmers, according to t... |
| 02.03.2021 | Anti-mastitis startup SomaDetect raises $6m Series A from Ag Capital Canada, Merck | Dairy farmers would save a lot of money — and tears over spilled milk — if they had a way to detect mastitis early.
The bacterial infection of the udders leads to a loss of roughly $200 per cow, per year for US dairy farmers, according to t... |
| 11.12.2020 | Syngenta partners with Sound Ag to launch ‘bio-inspired’ crop input in China | Swiss agro-chemical giant Syngenta is hoping to tackle nitrogen use in China while maintaining productivity through a new partnership with one of its portfolio companies: Emeryville, California-based molecular biology startup Sound Agricult... |
| 10.12.2020 | EXCLUSIVE: Beta Hatch banks $9.3m Series A, breaks ground on US’s largest insect farm | Mealworms may be the last critter that comes to mind when you hear the word ‘ranch,’ but Beta Hatch is hoping to change that perception – and a global pandemic presents the perfect opportunity.
“Some of our customers have reported as much a... |
| 08.06.2020 | Temasek leads $46m Series B for Ascus Bio’s microbe-based animal feed additives | The US animal health market generates around $10 billion in sales each year, according to the Animal Health Institute, and makes up roughly one-third of the global market. It is on pace to reach $73.6 billion by 2027. Although increased spe... |
| 22.05.2020 | Insects for animal feed startup Beta Hatch raises $3m Series A1 | Since insect protein became a buzzworthy segment a few years ago, the space has seen a number of startups creating innovative ways to use bugs for food from protein bars to animal feed.
“This is a huge market opportunity,” Virginia Emery, C... |
| 28.04.2020 | Zoetis’ acquisition of Performance Livestock Analytics is major milestone for livestock tech space | Monsanto’s acquisition of The Climate Corporation in 2013 marked a major turning point for the then-nascent agri-foodtech space. Since then, investment has flooded into startups innovating for food and farming from row crop production to tr... |
| 17.09.2019 | FarmWise raises $14.5m Series A to expand its weeding robot service | There are a number of robotics startups in the ag space targeting a variety of pain points throughout the supply chain and many of them have caught Silicon Valley’s eye. One of the biggest drivers of robotics innovation in agriculture is th... |
| 05.09.2019 | Why Fieldin stood out in crowded farm management software space | Editor’s Note: Michael Dean led AgFunder’s investment in Israel’s Fieldin — a $12 million Series A led by Zeev Ventures, a Silicon Valley-based venture fund managed by Oren Zeev, who has backed companies such as Houzz, Audible, Chegg, TripA... |