FoodTech Weekly #197 by Daniel S. Ruben

FoodTech Weekly #197

Hi there,

Well well well…if it isn’t the consequences of all my life decisions. This week I found myself on stage at the Unleashed Pet Tech Meet-Up in Stockholm (with Therese Angel of Verlinvest, and Bensam Solomon of Pet Media Group, moderated by Peter Van Staalduine of Purina), in front of 75+ pet tech founders, operators, investors, and experts.

Pets don’t like me. I don’t have a pet. I don’t even know much about the multi billion dollar pet tech market (except that the pet feed industry has a massive paw print). So the imposter syndrome kicked in big time again. But somehow I survived. And made a lot of new friends along the way.

This week's rundown:

• Cultivated meat launches in Singapore retail

• Rize banks $14M for more sustainable rice

• Volta Greentech pulls in $3M for methane-reducing feed additive

Let's go!

Conversations

Noteworthy

• U.S. company Good Meat (subsidiary of Eat Just) has announced that for the first time ever, cultivated meat will be sold in food retail (in the freezer section of Huber’s Butchery in Singapore) for consumers to purchase and bring home and cook. The meat has a new, lower cost formulation with just 3% cultivated chicken (the remainder is plant-based), while ‘maintaining the same taste, texture, and experience as conventional chicken.’ A 120g (4.2 oz) package will be priced at SDG 7.20, or about US $5.3.
  

• Singapore-based AgTech startup Rize, which was launched as a JV last year by Breakthrough Energy Ventures, Wavemaker Impact, Temasek, and GenZero, has secured $14M in Series A funding. Rice demand is projected to double by 2050 but traditional rice cultivation practices — like flooding fields — release huge amounts of methane gases. Rize’s solution can help cut water usage by 20%, while boosting crop yields. The backers hope the solution can help cut 100M tons of carbon emissions.

• Swedish biotech company Volta Greentech has scored SEK 32M (appr. $3M) in fresh funding in a round led by Novax (Axel Johnson Group), bringing its total funding to about SEK 100M (appr. $9.4m). Volta, which previously produced an algae-based feed additive to cut livestock methane emissions, has developed a second-generation low-cost additive called Lome which it aims to deliver to customers at scale by 2026, pending EU regulatory approval (full disclosure: I’m an investor and Board Member in Volta).

• Can you design a more climate-friendly cow — by e.g. selectively breeding low-methane cows, using feed additives, or even putting a gas mask on the cows? Or are these innovations just a bandaid for continued consumption of environmentally damaging beef and cheese

• Hexafarms, which leverages AI to optimize greenhouses and vertical indoor farms in real time, has raised €1.3M in a round led by Speedinvest and joined by Mudcake and Techstars. The company’s SaaS solution enables commercial indoor farmers to become 30% more efficient by predicting yields four weeks ahead with up to 95% accuracy.

• Israeli startup Profuse has bagged €2.4M (appr. $2.6M) in grants from the EU’s Horizon EIC Transition program to develop a supplement used in culture medium for cellular agriculture, speeding up the growth of cultivated meat. In related news, U.K. startup Meatly which develops a culture medium that ‘dramatically’ cuts the cost of cultivated meat is on the brink of receiving regulatory approval.

• U.K. startup Hexis, which uses advanced analytics from wearables to optimize athletes’ nutrition plans, has scooped up £1.6M (appr. $2M) in pre-seed from APEX, Sport Republic, and Dopamine Sport Ventures (h/t DigitalFoodLab).

• Peakbridge has just had its final close of its Growth Fund II with $187M committed, anchored by Edmond de Rothschild PE. In related news, Luxembourg-based Ocean 14 Capital has raised its first fund of €201M (appr. $218M) to invest in the ‘blue economy’ incl. food security and marine ecosystems. So far the fund has made 14 investments and deployed over €6M. Finally, Norrsken VC has closed a second fund at €320M (appr. $348M); the investor has previously backed FoodTech and AgTech startups such as Olio, Ignitia, Stockeld Dreamery, Matsmart/Motatos, Collectiv Food, and Karma.

• The World Bank says EU member states and other high-income countries should shift subsidies from emissions-heavy ‘wasteful’ foods like red meat toward greener fruit and veg, and fully price the environmental and health externalities of food. The EU’s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is about 1/3 of the Union’s long-term budget; over 80% of CAP funding has been used in the past decade for livestock. The World Bank report says consumer changes to healthy, low-emission diets would reduce diet-related emissions by up to 80% and reduce land and water use by 50%.

• A new report from U.K. campaign group Bite Back (led by chef Jamie Oliver) accuses food companies of using bright colors and cartoon characters to manipulate children into wanting junk food (products high in salt, sugar, and fat) such as chocolate, soft drinks, snacks, and ice cream.

News from the FoodTech Weekly community

• Nosh Bio (Germany) is looking for a Business Development Manager.

• If you have a plant-based article that you want to distribute, The Plant Based Briefing podcast uses AI to turn future food articles into podcasts (h/t Marina Schmidt).

• The Spot on Food conference happens on Oct 3, 2024 in Kristianstad, Sweden, exploring the theme “Resilient Systems” and featuring speakers and contributors like Sara Wimmercranz (Backing Minds), Matthieu Vincent (DigitalFoodLab), Annette Granéli (Green-On), Anders Engström (AGFO), Estefania Simon-Sasyk (Mycelium Gastronomy Network), Gittan Schiöld (Re:meat) and many others. Sign up here.

Want to share some FoodTech news/project with other FoodTech Weekly subscribers? Hit reply.

Random Stuff

• For the first time ever, scientists have observed an orangutan in Indonesia self-treat a wound using a tropical medicinal plant.

• How should novel ingredients be labelled to encourage trial and inform consumers? New McKinsey research shows health motivates, sustainability claims perform reasonably well, but vegan claims don’t motivate trials. Also, people don’t want their food to sound like a science project; labels like next-gen and bioengineered are not appealing (h/t Amanda Schaible)

• Dutch sustainable coffee brand De Koffiejongens is recruiting a ‘Board of Little Directors’, comprised entirely of children aged 8-12, to gain their perspectives (h/t Marie Dollé).

• If you’re looking for a cheap tractor, now is the time to buy, as there is a surplus of unsold tractors and combines.

• ‘France reclaims world record after baking baguette measuring 140.53m’ (that’s 459 ft.)

• It’s never too late to step in, I guess:

​I love you.
Daniel

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This issue was produced while listening to Stay by Lavrans Svendsen. Follow me on LinkedIn and Twitter. Did your brilliant friend forward this to you? Subscribe here.

Disclosures: I'm founder of Solvable Syndicate. I’m an operating advisor to VC/investment firms Nordic FoodTech VC, Mudcake, and Blume Equity. I'm a mentor at accelerators Katapult Ocean, Big Idea Ventures, and Norrsken Accelerator. I'm an advisor to BIOMILQ, FoodHack, Hooked, Ignitia, Improvin, IRRIOT, Juicy Marbles, Lupinta, NitroCapt, Oceanium, petgood, Rootically, Stockeld Dreamery, Transship, VEAT, and Volta Greentech; in some of these startups, I have equity.

Boring disclaimer: The newsletter content is intended only to provide general and preliminary information to folks interested in FoodTech, and shall not be construed as the basis for any investment decision or strategy. I assume no liability in regards to any investment, divestment, or retention decision taken by readers of this newsletter content.