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- FoodTech Weekly #34 by Daniel S. Ruben
FoodTech Weekly #34 by Daniel S. Ruben
News on FoodTech, food, and society
Daniel S. Ruben
January 29, 2021 • Estimated Reading Time: 11 minutes
FoodTech Weekly #34
Hi there,
I recently joined Clubhouse, a new (iPhone only) audio-based social media app. Am not 'sold' yet, but it's definitely been all over my social media feeds this week -- and I think this app has potential. Unless you refuse to join any club that would have you as a member, I have 7 invites if anyone is eager to try.
We've already received applications for the Norrsken Impact Accelerator from over 50 countries. And these startups are working onsomany potentially transformative solutions. So that's exciting. If you know an early-startup (ideally FoodTech, but also in other verticals), please tell them to apply, or at least tag them in this post.
Speaking about accelerators, Food System 6 (FS6) over in California is calling for food system entrepreneurs ot apply for its 7th cohort. More info here.
Wishing you all a great weekend -- hope you enjoy today's edition of FoodTech Weekly!
Highlights
Conversations: N/A
Noteworthy: Bear Flag Robotics raises $7.9M for autonomous tractors; insurtech Pula secures $6M to help African smallholder farmers get insured; Ukko closes $40M round to design foods for people with e.g. gluten and peanut sensitivities; Pieter Pot has success with circular supermarket in Rotterdam; the startup Phospholutions, which just raised $10.3M, can reduce fertilizer use by up to 75%
News from the FoodTech Weekly community
Random Stuff: Unhealthy snacks getting banned at U.K. checkout counters. Obese pets. Salmon cannons. And more.
Conversations
Noteworthy
Swedish FoodTech startup Sproud, which produces plant-based milk sourced from yellow split peas, has raised $6.6M, to help fund an expansion into the U.K. and North America. Sproud follows the success model of (fellow Swedish plant-based dairy brand) Oatly, recruiting baristas as brand ambassadors. More on Sproud's raise here.
Image: Sproud
Imperfect Foods of San Francisco has completed a €95M Series D raise. The company offers weekly grocery deliveries filled by subscription, including food items that due to aesthetic flaws or short shelf-lives aren't sold in supermarkets. The company has a subscriber base of 350,000 customers and closed 2020 with a revenue run rate above $500M.
Bear Flag Robotics has bagged $7.9M in an extended Seed round. Based in Sunnyvale, CA, the company helps upgrade traditional tractors to autonomous tractors, that can be piloted by human supervisors from a handheld device or a remotely-based control room. This enables the operation of many machines at once. Customers for Bear Flag include vegetable and commodity growers in Arizona and California.
Kenyan insurtech startup Pula has raised $6M in Series A to help derisk smallholder farmers across Sub-Saharan Africa. The company delivers ag insurance and digital products to help smallholder farmers tackle climate risks, improve their farming practices, and boost incomes. The traditional method of calculating insurance is made via farm visits. This isn't feasible for the smallholder farmer segment, and therefore it has been neglected -- leaving the farmers unprotected and uninsured from floods, droughts, pestilence, and hail. Pula leverages machine learning and other data points to calculate risks. The company is now expanding across the continent.
Israeli anti-allergy FoodTech startup Ukko has raised a $40M Series B lead by Bayer's corporate VC Leaps by Bayer. Other investors include e.g. Khosla Ventures, TIME Ventures, and PeakBridge Ventures. Ukko has developed a AI-driven protein engineering platform that enables the company to develop healthier foods -- more specifically designed for people with sensitivities such as celiac (gluten) and e.g. peanut allergy. The company is for example developing a new type of gluten that will allow bakers and food companies to produce products like bread, pasta, pizza, and baked goods that even people with celiac can enjoy.
Ukko Co-Founders Anat Binur and Yanay Ofran. Image source: Ukko
Hong Kong-based Avant Meats, which develops cell-based seafood, has announced a strategic partnership with VHC, the largest pangasius fish company in the world. VHC also becomes a shareholder in Avant after having acquired Singapore-based Vinh Technology, which held a minority interest in Avant.
Resource use has tripled since 1970. The average European consumer today produces 20 kg of plastic waste each year, from packaged groceries in supermarkets. Pieter Pot, in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, plans to change this. The company has 30,000 people on its waiting list, but only served 3,000 in 2020. Customers place orders online, pick a delivery date, and receive foods in deposit glass pots through the Dutch post PostNL's special food delivery service. Once a consumer has emptied a glass pot, it's returned with the next delivery. The company sells 250 items vs. the 30,000 SKUs of a regular supermarket. Consumers do not seem to mind. Pieter Pot has raised about €3M so far.
Estonian delivery robot company Starship Technologies has raised $17M. Robots from the startup can be found e.g. at U.S. university campuses, delivering food to hungry students. The company is busy expanding across the U.S. and U.K. and plans to develop a robot that can climb stairs.
Starship Technologies robot. Image: Wikimedia Commons
Phospholutions of Pennsylvania, USA, has raised $10.3M in Series A, to expand its sustainable fertilizer technology. Fertilizer is one of the most widely uses ag inputs, but it's also a major environmental polluter, e.g. creating algae blooms, which lead to dead-zones, inhospitable to all marine life. In short, Phospholutions has developed a fertilized additive called RhizoSorb that boosts the efficiency of fertilizers. The company claims that it can help reduce the use of fertilizer by up to 75%. Other companies to watch in the fertilizer innovation space; WISErg, California Safe Soil, Vultus, Ostara, and Sound Agriculture.
Bangalore-based Cropin has secured $20M in Series C financing. The company provides data analysis on crop yields and risks, using satellites, sensors, and weather data.
Tevel Aerobotics Technologies has taken in $20M in new funding, bringing its total funds raised above $30M. Based in Israel, the startup develops flying drones that can pick fruits in orchards. The drones can also be used for other tasks such as pruning, trimming, and thinning, which typically require human labor. This video shows the drones in action.
Entomo Farms of Ontario, Canada has raised $3.7M CAD. The company farms crickets, that are turned into baking flour, whole roasted crickets, and protein powder. Entomo also supplies crickets to other companies, to be used in e.g. pet food, fertilizer, and snacks. Other companies to watch in this space includes e.g. Hargol from Israel, and Aspire Food Group of the U.S.
PAULIG's corporate venture arm PINC has invested in the €2M Seed round of MIRAI FOODS, which works to bring cell-based meat to market. Based in Switzerland, MIRAI currently focuses on Wagyu beef.
The MIRAI team, and a prototype product. Image source: PAULIC/PINC
News from the FoodTech Weekly community
Grant Gordon, Ph.D., is putting together a new venture that leverages machine learning to develop food products that reduce malnutrition in low-income countries. He's looking for collaborating partners -- feel free to drop him a line.
Joost Matthijssen of Nutreco NuFrontiers is looking to hire an Investment Associate, to be based in the Netherlands. Profile: Life-science expertise, an affinity for food/ag, eager to deep-dive into technology, inviting, and business development.
Sustainable Agriculture and Food Systems Funders (SAFSF) is looking for a Comms Director. Remotely based; must be in the U.S.
Want to share some FoodTech news/project with other FoodTech Weekly subscribers? Hit reply.
Random Stuff
Unhealthy snacks will be banned from supermarket checkouts in England starting in 2022.
Also in the U.K., 50% of dogs and 40% of cats are obese. Startups across the world are now trying to tackle pet obesity.
I enjoyed this text by serial angel investor Sophia Bendtz (at Cherry VC, formerly with Atomico and Spotify) on how to raise Series A.
Was also intrigued by this smallholder farmer in Burundi who discovered a smart way to reduce post-harvest food losses for his tomato harvest.
Airbag jeans for motorcyclists is now a thing, thanks to a Swedish company.
If you have never seen the (4 min) Salmon Cannon video featuring Whooshh Innovations, you're in for a treat (the technology is actually a real thing).
Image: YouTube
I love you.
Daniel
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