🪐 Houston, We Have a Protein

It’s hard to keep track of the ‘startups to watch’ in Food and Agriculture, as Founders continuously bringing fresh solutions to the table. So who’s standing out in 2025?

This week, we asked 17 AgriFood investors which startups they’re excited by.

In the mix includes:

• Revyve - converting existing yeast biomasses into natural proteins

• Epoch - making it easier to track and reward regenerative practices

• Agrobiomics - enhancing agricultural resilience through biostimulants

• Olsaro - developing a new variety of wheat that could grow in salty soils

• Planet A Foods - future-proof chocolate through precision fermentation

• Omics - using AI for trait discovery to create more climate resilient crops

• Protera - leveraging AI and engineering to create new functional ingredients

• Ironic Biotech - tackling iron deficiency with a novel, protein-based ingredient

• + 30 more startups.

Head this way to see the rundown on top startups to watch.

This week in FoodTech:

💶 120 GPs, CVCs, VCs to meet at HackSummit
☕️ Beanless coffee’s new ingredients platform
👩‍🔬 170 reasons why future of AgriFood is female

The Digest

💸 120 investors (CVCs, VCs, GPs, Asset Managers, Syndicates) all heading to the HackSummit, mapped.

📈 What’s up? Researchers have found that rising temperatures and CO₂ levels from climate change are increasing arsenic levels in rice, heightening health risks for billions who rely on it as a staple food.

📉 What’s down? Atlantic Natural Foods, the US plant-based company behind brands like Loma Linda and TUNO, has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. And vegan burger chain Neat Burger is closing all its UK locations due to financial struggles, ending its six-year run.

🪐 A team of UK researchers and space-tech companies has launched a miniature lab containing yeast microbes designed to produce proteins into orbit to test whether precision fermentation can produce food, medicine, fuel, and bioplastics in space, aiming to support sustainable living on long-duration missions.

🎨 The FDA has asked food companies to voluntarily phase out six petroleum-based artificial dyes by the end of 2025, with plans to revoke authorisation for others and promote the use of natural colour alternatives.

👀 Good Guide: The lean startup meets FoodTech: A new approach to scaling smarter in food biomanufacturing.

Fundraising

🌞 US-based UbiQD raised $20 million Series B funding to scale its safer, cadmium-free quantum dot technology for use in agriculture and solar energy, aiming to boost efficiency and lower costs across both industries.

💸 The University of Copenhagen received a 50 million kroner ($7.6 million) grant from Danish pharma giant Novo Nordisk to lead a seven-year project using AI and food science to develop less processed plant-based proteins.

🐟 Simpliigood secured a $4 million grant from the Israel Innovation Authority and is working towards commercial production of its plant-based smoked salmon, supported by EFSA clearance for its key spirulina ingredient and the launch of a large-scale manufacturing line.

🏭 Aston University’s Biochar CleanTech Accelerator, which converts factory and agricultural waste into clean energy and valuable bioproducts using pyrolysis, has been extended for another year with £700,000 in new government funding as part of the UK’s Innovation Accelerator program.

🇦🇷 Puna Bio, an Argentine startup using extremophile microbes to boost crop resilience, secured funding from Corteva Catalyst, becoming the first Latin American company to do so and marking a major milestone for the region’s biotech sector.

🪽 Red Bull launched a corporate venture capital arm, Red Bull Ventures, to invest in early-stage startups across sports, sustainability, and other strategic areas like supply chain innovation, and human performance.

💸 Good read: Is VC a fit for AgTech? Tenacious Ventures’ Sarah Nolet gives a rundown.

New in Startups

👎 Perfect Day is being sued by GMO/Toxin Free USA and the Organic Consumers Association, who allege the company misled consumers by marketing its precision-fermented dairy protein as equivalent to cow-derived whey, despite independent testing suggesting it contains mostly fungal proteins and lacks the nutritional profile of traditional dairy.

🍚 Bangalore-based altM has developed a thermochemical process that converts various agricultural wastes—such as rice straw and sugarcane bagasse—into valuable materials like adhesives and cosmetic ingredients.

☕️ Compound Foods, maker of the Minus beanless coffee brand, has expanded into B2B with a new ingredients platform offering coffee, cocoa, and chocolate alternatives, using a proprietary database and scalable formulations made from upcycled and plant-based ingredients. Read the Founder’s op-ed in Green Queen.

🌴 Californian startup Checkerspot has developed a non-GMO algal oil that closely mimics high-oleic palm oil in composition and performance, offering a sustainable, domestically produced alternative for use in high-value applications like infant formula, cosmetics, and nutraceuticals.

🧫 Moolec Science has completed an all-stock merger with Bioceres Group, forming a larger entity focused on sustainable food innovation through molecular farming. Here’s their founder’s story.

🇩🇰 Danish biotech 21st.BIO has created a safer strain of Aspergillus oryzae by removing all known pathways that produce harmful toxins and antibiotics, making it better suited for use in food protein production.

✏️ Israel’s Evogene has signed a definitive agreement for ICL to acquire the majority of its subsidiary Lavie Bio’s operations, along with its MicroBoost AI for AG platform, which uses computational biology and AI to develop microbiome-based agricultural products aimed at enhancing crop productivity and sustainability. Get the backstory.

🐾 ​In recent trials, MicroHarvest's MPX microbial protein outperformed a conventional pet food formula in palatability, with cats and dogs preferring and consuming more of the MPX-based kibble.

Plant Based

🐷 La Vie launched a collaborative campaign inviting plant-based brands to reuse and adapt its TV ad featuring a rescue pig, encouraging cross-brand partnerships to promote animal welfare and informed food choices, with Beyond Meat among the first to join.

🍽️ UK startup THIS launched a new whole-food plant protein range called THIS Is Super Superfood, offering a high-protein, minimally processed alternative to tofu and tempeh as part of its shift away from meat analogues and towards health-focused innovation.

🍄 Happiee debuted a UK-first range of easy-cook lion’s mane mushroom chunks in Sainsbury’s, offering a whole food, ready-to-cook alternative to processed plant-based meats in response to growing consumer demand for natural vegetarian options.

🥤 Minor Figures unveiled Hyper Oat, a new range of functional oat drinks infused with adaptogens and nootropics in four flavours, offering a plant-based option that blends taste with wellness to meet rising consumer demand.

Big Food

💡 Almendra has developed a “night interruption” lighting technology for open-field agriculture that uses LED-equipped irrigation rigs to manipulate crop flowering and significantly boost yields in crops like soybeans, rice, and stevia.

🤝 Nestlé and Olam Food Ingredients launched their largest joint agroforestry initiative, aiming to support 25,000 cocoa farmers in Nigeria, Côte d'Ivoire, and Brazil with climate-smart practices and tree planting to reduce over 1.5 million tons of CO₂ emissions over 30 years.

🍞 Corbion debuted Verdad Essence WH100, a cultured wheat-based mould inhibitor for bread and bakery products that offers a natural alternative to artificial preservatives.

🍇 Aldi launched the UK’s first still prosecco, made from the same Glera grapes as traditional sparkling prosecco.

👀 JBS received SEC approval to list its shares on the New York Stock Exchange, despite strong opposition from environmental groups and U.S. lawmakers concerned about its climate impact, corruption history, and potential market dominance.

From the Community

Get hired in FoodTech

• Omni Pet (UK) is hiring a CRM Manager

• Nutropy (France) are hiring a Fermentation Scientist

• Vorwerk Ventures (Germany) is looking for a Principal

👩‍🔬 Opinion: Why the future of AgriFoodTech is female.

🎧 Good listen: Arsenal Bioyards’ fundraising playbook.

🚜 Good watch: The farm inside a supermarket.

👋 Join us at a FoodHack Meetup in Dubai, Zurich, Berlin. Sign up here.

🐓 Just for fun: Competitor slide on the pitch deck.

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Until next time - Stay Hungry