Finistere Venture, a food technologies based company along with three other Israeli firms, announced their partnership in investing $100 million in Israel in agrifood startups.
Finistere will be joined by OurCrowd, Israel’s largest venture investors, Tempo, a beverage company, and Tnuva, the largest food company in Israel. The partnership was formed as a result of the Israeli government’s innovations incubator which was established to focus on food technology. The four companies have grouped to bid for the chance to operate the incubator which is being built in north Israel.
According to Arama Kukutai, the co-founder at Finistere Ventures, Israel has turned into a major innovation hub in the AgTech and FoodTech arena. He also mentioned that the Finistere is committed to expanding the local network by increasing investment in Israeli companies as well as supporting them at the same time across the whole food and AG value chains as they look towards penetrating the global market.
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According to Jonathan Medved, the Chief Executive Officer at OurCrowd, FoodTech is currently the hottest industry in the Israeli innovation arena. With four master chefs OurCrowd, Finistere, Tempo and Tnuva ready to come together and cook, Medved expects spectacular and scrumptious results.
The four companies have formed a consortium that will focus on Israeli technologies through the entire beverage and food value chain. This includes nutrition and alternative value improvements, functional ingredients, as well as supply chain efficiency.
FoodTech is currently a growing trend all over the globe. Interestingly, Israel has been standing out in this arena for a while with over 250 active companies in the field. This has led to plenty of investment activity with over 19 to 33 venture-backed investments happening annually since 2014. In fact, FoodTech companies alone brought in $117 million in twenty-seven rounds.
International funds focused on the FoodTech arena have been investing in Israel for a while. The latest announcement by Finistere Ventures is proof of this. Israel can stand out in this field due to its combination of academia, technology, and research, which has encouraged leading players from high tech to move into the FoodTech field to solve the major growing challenge.
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FoodTech came about as a result of looking for a solution for shared concerns like food waste, diabetes, etc. According to Amir Zaidman, the vice president of a food-tech incubator in Israel, half of the world does not have enough food while the remaining half does not have the right kind of food. It is time to right these wrongs by coming up with innovative solutions.
