Startup news and deals
🇺🇸 🤖 Serve Robotics, a US startup, raised $80M to scale its sidewalk delivery robots. It plans to deploy 2,000 robots in the streets of Los Angelis and otherUS cities.
🇮🇳🚜 MoonRider, an India-based startup, raised $2.2M to develop electric tractors for sustainable farming.
🇺🇸🌱 Plenty, a US startup, once a leader in the vertical farming space, is in talks to raise funds at a valuation cut for more than 90% from its peak. The consolidation in this space, which is largely done in Europe, is still underway in the US (which was less affected by the energy crisis that made it more violent in the old continent).
🇺🇸🍖 Sundial Foods, a US startup backed by Nestlé developing an innovative technology to create tastier plant-based food products with a short list of ingredients, closes down and sells its intellectual property after financial difficulties. While there is a huge space for disruptive innovation in plant-based, price and scale are now the main keywords to thrive.
🇺🇸🧪 Biosphere, a US startup, raised $8.8M for a new type of bioreactor that can be sterilised with UV light rather than steam, resulting in reduced costs for the production of bioproducts.
🇺🇸🌾 Inari, a US startup, raised $144M for its seed technology that improves crop resilience and yields by leveraging gene-editing techniques.
🇮🇱 🌿 Fermata, an Israeli startup, raised $10M for its computer vision technology for detecting plant diseases and pests in plants.
🇫🇷 🚜 Sencrop, a French startup developing weather and irrigation sensors for agriculture, was acquired by Isagri, a leading precision agriculture company. Sencrop is among the 30 startups that we selected a month ago as part of our France FoodTech 30 as the most promising startups.
Regulation & public support
🇺🇸 🍔 Beyond Meat, a leading plant-based meat alternative startup, released its lifecycle assessment (LCA) for its Beyond Steak product with 84% less greenhouse gas emissions, 93% less water consumption, 88% less land use, and 65% less non-renewable energy use.
🇫🇷🥛 Bon Vivant, a French precision fermentation startup, received a self-affirmed GRAS status in the US, enabling it to commercialise its whey protein.
Industry new & trends
🪔 A new study on the ketogenic diet (high fat, high protein, low carbs) shows how it alter the metabolism, potentially supporting brain health and reducing inflammation. The study, and others following, could reinforce the already strong growth of the category.
💉 GLP-1 drugs have a strong impact on food sales: a study shows that there is a 6% grocery spending cut. The decline is progressive and then it stabilises about 12 months after the start of the treatment. Further data will be needed to better understand if this is only a decline in volumes or if it is also a shift in what is consumed.
