Startup news and deals
๐ฆ๐บ๐ฒ Agriwebb, an Australian startup, raised $7M for its livestock management software. It helps players alongside the value chain access and share data on the stock and emissions.
๐ธ๐ช๐ Volta Greentech, a Swedish startup, raised $2.95M for its โnext-generationโ methane-reducing cattle feed additive. This space is exciting and moving fast: from a handful of companies working on red algae, there is now a wide ecosystem of research, large companies, and startups developing a range of solutions to reduce the impact of animal farming. Also, many large companies support them with experiments (BEL, Mars, General Millsโฆ), which obviously helps drive more funding. However, beyond the current hype, at least three challenges remain:
- – Price (who pays for the additive, vaccine, or other solution and its eventual impact on milk production)
- – Scale
- – Efficiency (lowering methane emissions by 20 to 30% wonโt solve our problem).
However, it remains one of the most obvious areas to which investors and leading companies should pay attention.
๐ธ๐ฌย ๐พ Rize, a Singapore-based startup, raised $14M to make rice cultivation more sustainable through data analytics and precision agriculture techniques.
๐บ๐ธ๐ผ ByHeart, an American startup, raised $95M for its infant formula. This is quite an impressive story of a company that built from scratch an end-to-end production capability for a very complex product (and which also benefited from good timing with the shortage of formula in the US).
๐บ๐ธ๐ด Restaurant365, an American startup, raised $175M for its foodservice management software with features ranging from accounting to workforce.
๐จ๐ญ๐ค Mimic, a Swiss startup, raised โฌ2.3M for its robot arms with humanoid hands. They are here to solve the increasing labour shortage in industries such as food service.
๐ฎ๐ณ๐ฑ Niqo Robotics, an Indian startup, raised $13M for its spraying technology for agriculture, which aims to reduce the use of chemicals. As for most of the new wave of agriculture robots, it is made to integrate with existing equipment.
๐ฉ๐ช๐ฑ Hexafarms, a German startup, raised โฌ1.3M to make indoor farming more efficient and increase yields through AI.
๐บ๐ธย ๐ฝ Cheetah, an American startup, raised $14M for its integrated ingredient delivery platform for restaurants.
๐ฌ๐งย ๐ฅ OSY Group, a British startup, raised ยฃ750K for its antimicrobial packaging technology that increases the shelf-life of food produce.
Industry news & trends
๐ย ๐ย A good read on Ultra-processed foods (UPF), where the terminology comes from and the state of science on their potentially harmful effects. One of the most contentious topics is the correlation between chronic diseases (diabetes and also inflammatory diseases) and the consumption of UPF. Is it UPF that causes these conditions, a sub-group, or something else?
As always, very interesting newsletter!