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FoodTech Weekly #92 by Daniel S. Ruben
News on FoodTech, food, and society
Daniel S. Ruben
March 25, 2022 • Estimated Reading Time: 14 minutes
FoodTech Weekly #92
Hi there,
Former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright passed away this week. For some, she was a trailblazer, being the first woman to ever serve as the nation's top diplomat. For others, she was as a staunch defender of democracy, freedom, and human rights, at home and abroad. And for others still, she was an imperial warmonger.
For me, she was my professor at Georgetown University, where she taught diplomacy and foreign policy for almost 40 years. Taking her class back in 2015 was inspiring, a privilege, and also nerve-wrecking, because she expected excellence, and for everyone to know the facts. She commanded presence when entering the room. But she was warm and had humor (see e.g. this 2017 tweet re. the solar eclipse, which was really a jab against the Trump administration). Beyond the weekly class, all of us had 1:1 lunch with her, and got the office hours we requested. She was there for us, and was always engaged.
One weekend, we did a diplomacy simulation in class. Together with a classmate, I represented Russia; we invaded a European country (a 'special military operation', really...), forcing our opponents including the EU and NATO to respond. This scenario is of course eerily timely today, given Russia's invasion of Ukraine. In her last piece for the New York Times, Dr. Albright wrote that Putin's invasion would be a historic mistake. She cared deeply about global issues until the very end. I hope that she now is at peace.
Me with Dr. Albright and Ani C., who represented Russia together with me in our diplomacy simulation
This week's rundown:
Thrive Agric of Nigeria secures $56.4M in financing to help smallholder farmers increase their incomes
U.K. startup Breedr nabs $15.8M Series A to help farmers collect livestock data and boost efficiency
DSM starts pilot with 200 Dutch dairy farms to reduce cow methane emissions by 30% using feed additive
Let's go!
Conversations
I recently spoke with Pat Schnettler, Co-Founder of 12 Tides. Pat grew up in a family that always fostered a positive connection with the planet. He worked in the seafood space in Alaska, Indonesia, and Mexico, and was horrified by what he saw from an environmental standpoint. He decided to do something that’d have a positive impact on the ocean. ‘The old way, of large-scale commercial fishing and aquaculture, is mostly extractive. We wanted to farm the ocean in a regenerative way and support the economic transition of coastal communities away from extractive industries. 12 Tides sources organic kelp from US farmers and makes ultra-sustainable and nutrient dense snacks to replace the stuff made of ultraprocessed corn, wheat, rice, and potato that covers the snacks aisles.’ Pat explains. Thus, 12 Tides was born, and it launched in November 2020. 12 Tides products are now found in 450 retailers around the US, including Whole Foods and Thrive Market. The company closed a $1.5M Angel round last year, and plans to raise capital later this year to expand the team, increase production volumes, and finance the distribution growth. ‘Our biggest challenges are probably around scaling manufacturing and distribution in the most cash-efficient way’ says Pat. 12 Tides is interested in connecting with people wanting to help tell the story of regenerative ocean farming. The startup is also developing relations with relevant investors and other future fundraising opportunities. To get in touch with Pat, you can reach him via LinkedIn and email.
Left image: Pat doing ocean stuff. Right image: 12 Tides' products
Noteworthy
Nigerian company Thrive Agric has banked $56.4M in debt. The startup runs 450+ warehouses, which enable smallholder farmers to store their goods before they're sold at a premium price, often to global markets. Thrive Agric says it has helped farmers increase their incomes by 25% (Africa is home to 30M+ smallholder farmers, producing almost 70% of the continent's locally-grown food supply. Most live on less than $1.90 per day). The company will use the new funding to e.g. expand to Ghana, Zambia, and Kenya.
German startup Vytal has nabbed $10M in funding. Founded in 2019, the company has devewloped a reusable packaging system with 100% leak-proof bowls for take-out and delivery food. The solution is targeting restaurants, supermarkets, delivery services and canteen operators. Consumers register in an app to receive their food in Vytal's bowls, and return them to any partner outlet where the bowls are locally cleaned. Vytal says is handles around 200,000 users and works with 2,000 partners including restaurants and caterers. Meanwhile in the sustainable packaging space, Starbucks is lookingto reduce its disposable cups use, running 20 different tests across eight markets to figure out the best ways to ditch the single-use cup.
Wanda Fish Technologies of Israel announced $3M in pre-seed funding led by The Strauss Group's The Kitchen FoodTech Hub. Formed last year, the company has now signed agreements with Tufts University to advance its mission of bringing to market cell-cultivated fish fillets. In other news from the cultivated meats world, the Netherlands is moving closer to making tasting of cultivated meat legal.
Image: Wanda Fish Technologies
U.K. livestock management platform Breedr has secured £12M ($15.8M) in Series A funding. The company allows farmors to record animal data such as genetics, weight, health, fertility, and medication on a smartphone app (the data can be manually added as well automatically imported from sensors, wearables, and tags). The farmer can then use these insights to improve efficiency. Breedr also runs an online marketplace where farmers can trade their livestock. The company now plans to expand to the U.S. and Australia.
Miso Robotics has partnered with U.S. restaurant chain Chipotle to deploy a tortilla chip-cooking robot.
U.S. alt protein company Eat Just has broken ground on a $120M production facility in Singapore. When completed, it will be the largest of its kind in the country. Eat Just will produce plant-based egg substitutes and cultivated meat at the facility.
Dutch company DSM will run a pilot project with 200 dairy farms, feeding the cows a methane reducing feed additive. DSM's product, called Bovaer, reduces enteric methane emissions by up to 30%. In related news, half of the world's top 35 meat and dairy companies are not even measuring their climate impact.
Texas company Hylio develops drones that each can spray 15 to 35 acres (6 to 14 hectares) per hour, for weed control. They hope to produce 300 drones this year.
Software image of targeted weed spraying of a field
ASC (Aquaculture Stewardship Council) is deploying new tech to help combat seafood fraud. Using 'trace element fingerprinting', digital tagging, and tracing technology, as well as a chain of custody protocols, it will be possible to trace ASC-certified seafood back to its farm of origin with 95 accuracy, according to ASC.
Berkeley, U.S. startup UMARO Foods has bagged $3M in Seed funding, in a round led by AgFunder. The company develops plant-based bacon using red seaweed. Founded in 2019, UMARO will launch its first product in restaurants during Q2 2022. The company has previously raised $6M in soft funding from e.g. ARPA-E, the Good Food Institute, and Activate Fellows.
AgFunder, which just closed a new $60M to $100M Fund, just released the 2022 AgFunder AgriFoodTech Investment report. Some headline findings: $51.7B was invested in AgTech and FoodTech companies in 2021, up with 85% vs. 2020. There were 3,155 discrete deals by 4,570 investors; the largest one was Furong Xingsheng in China (eGrocery case). eGrocery in fact grew by 188% year-on-year, driven by pandemic-driven shopping patterns. 'Innovative food' including alt. protein saw a 103% growth in 2021 vs. 2020, reaching $4.8B in investment.
Vevolution, a U.S. based marketplace to matchmake investors with startups in alternative protein, has raised a $330,000 Seed round. The financing was led by Capital V, Kale United, and Cult Food Science.
Image: Vevolution
New report from WHO on sugar-sweetened beverage taxes in the EU.
A new study from Wageningen University & Research shows that 98.4% of all food and beverages available in Dutch supermarkets in 2020 was actually sold; just 1.6% (as measured by weight in kilos) did not reach consumers. This means that amoung of food wasted went down from 2018 to 2020. In terms of food waste per product category, 7.8% of bread and pastried was wasted, followed by fresh meat and fresh fish (2.4%) and potatoes/vegetables/fruit (2.4%).
News from the FoodTech Weekly Community
Libre Foods (Spain) is hiring for a number of positions... Tender Food (US) is recruiting a Senior Food Equipment Engineer and also a Senior Process Engineer... BIOMILQ (US) is looking for a Scientist... SAVEGGY (Sweden) wants to bring on a Lab Assistant... FoodHack / Hack Ventures (remote) has several open roles, including Head of Product, Head of Comms, Head of Brand, a Community Manager, and a Legal/Admin Assistant... Melt&Marble (Sweden) is looking for a Head of Food Science... MeliBio (US) has a bunch of open positions... EVERY (US) is hiring a Director of Brand and Communications... michroma (Argentina) is recruiting a Bioinformatics Specialist.
Want to share some FoodTech news/project with other FoodTech Weekly subscribers? Hit reply.
Random Stuff
Are you a startup building a pre-seed pitch deck? Here's a very helpful guide.
Eating the Earth -- this column is really worth reading. A select quote: 'The food system produces one-third of our greenhouse emissions, about 18 gigatons annually. Even if we magically switched off all our other emissions tomorrow, we’d need to cut that close to zero by 2050 to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius. If we also wanted to feed a population expected to approach 10 billion by 2050, we’d need to make those drastic cuts while jacking up food production by more than 50 percent.'
Shoji Morimoto, or Rental-san as he's known in Japan, is hired by clients to do nothing. He will show up when required and simply be there, with no judgment. He's waited at the end of a marathon so a runner could see a familiar face at the finish line; he's accompanied a recently divorced woman to lunch; he dramatically waved farewell to someone boarding a train; and once, he sat nearby to prevent a student from slacking off from their studies. Morimoto accidently started his career after being told in previous jobs that he wasn't doing enough and didn't have enough initiative to succeed. 'I decided to take advantage of this and make it into a business', Morimoto says.
Shoji Morimoto
I love you.
Daniel
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This issue was produced while listening to Motherlover by The Lonely Island and Justin Timberlake. Follow me on LinkedIn and Twitter. And here's the Appetizerwhich I co-host. Did your brilliant friend forward this to you? Subscribe here.