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The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

TrusTrace

With New Funding in Hand, TrusTrace Looks To Make Supply Chains More Sustainable

Supply chain is the buzz phrase filling daily news headlines related to empty supermarket shelves and this year’s hottest toys being in short supply. Specifically, one longer-term issue is the traceability of products—especially food and other perishables—as consumers become increasingly conscious of their health and the environment.

Companies such as Stockholm-based TrusTrace are among those who are applying a combination of technologies to empower suppliers and consumers in the flow of information from field or processing plant to table. To further its growth in this space, the company recently received a $6 million investment from Industrifonden and Fairpoint Capital. The funds will be used for product development, global expansion, and building out the company’s management team.


“TrusTrace enables product-level traceability and supply chain transparency to drive better, more sustainably-conscious and socially responsible sourcing decisions,” said Shameek Ghosh, CEO, and Co-Founder of TrusTrace said in an interview with The Spoon. “With this latest funding round, we will continue leveraging cutting-edge technology and the best minds in the industry to achieve positive, restorative change for people and the planet.”

Consumer interest in the details about the origins of their various foods is becoming more than just a nice-to-have. According to research by ADM, the trend had been growing for several years with the pandemic, and it’s the associated concerns about health and safety, acting as a catalyst for a greater understanding of what is in everything from farm-fresh tomatoes to canned string beans. Global supplier ADM discovered 58% of global consumers would be more concerned with locality claims because of COVID-19. In addition, ADM reports that 38% of global consumers will back their interest in sustainability with their wallets and pay more for verified products.

Among the details of sustainability, tracing include place of origin, ingredients, the use of chemicals, processing stops along the route, and other factors related to the environment.


TrusTrace hopes to expand beyond its current client base, including Coop, a Swedish retail chain. As Ghosh explains, one of TrusTrace’s signature advantages is that it fully integrates with a client’s ERP system using blockchain and its own proprietary technology. Being connected to Coop’s inventory management system allows TrusTrace to collect accurate information to document sustainability, which measures ten different parameters across 10,000 food products. In simple terms, TrusTrace creates a mapping of a product’s supply chain, which allows a customer to know essential details about a given product.


In the case of Coop, consumers can use an application that deploys a scanner to investigate the sustainability of a product and manifest that information in an easy-to-read diagram. The parameters used by Coop via its TrusTace implementation are based on an agreement by the county’s leading companies in conjunction with The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF).


Ghosh hopes to bring TrusTrace to major retailers across Europe in the coming months and is even eyeing the United States as a potential target. At issue, he explains, is the need for national consensus on specific areas to measure to create a helpful mapping. The lack of a universal agreement in sustainability will be a hindrance to educating consumers worldwide.


TrusTrace is not alone in looking to cash in on this trend. Other companies in this space include Alpharetta, GA-based Aptean, IBM with its Food Trust product, and New York-based ripe.io

The Week in Food Tech Funding: Culture Biosciences & Tufts Nab Funding as Interest in Scaling Cell Ag Grows

Over the past 12 months, money has poured into cultivated meat startups as venture investors, celebrities, and governments look to get in on what many believe is the next big thing in alternative protein.

However, as the excitement grows, some are taking a harder look at how to scale the production of lab-grown meat to make a dent in the larger animal-based meat market. According to one estimate, the industry will need up to $30 billion invested in cell-based/fermentation production capacity if the alternative protein market hits just 11% of total meat consumption by 2035 and significantly more if consumer adoption exceeds expectations.

Much of that $30 billion will be directed to capital investment in building out long-term production capacity. However, before we get there, the industry first needs to invest in organizations building the necessary technology and production platforms to enable scale-up. This week saw two significant investments intended for just that: Culture Biosciences ($80 million) and Tufts University & partners ($10 million).

Culture Biosciences helps companies developing future food products with its bioreactor-as-a-service platform. The company introduced its first product a couple of years ago, a cloud-connected benchtop bioreactor service for cell-culture and bioprocess development. With their new round of funding, Culture looks to move beyond the bench with cloud-connected 5L and 250L bioreactors-as-a-service that will help firms optimize for pilot scale bio-manufacturing.

The second investment isn’t a traditional venture investment, but the $10 million USDA funding award to Tufts University for a cultured protein center of excellence is a vital investment nonetheless. In partnership with others, Tufts will lead an Institute for Cellular Agriculture to develop foundational technologies and processes to enable the cultivated meat industry to progress towards scaled production. The foundational work done by this organization will include everything from research on next-generation cell-culture medium to the development of education and leadership programs for the cultivated meat industry.

As companies try to take cultivated meat from the lab to the manufacturing plant, some question if cellular agriculture will ever be able to scale upwards cost-effectively and safely enough to justify all the investment. While we won’t know the answer to this question for a few years, it’s an encouraging sign that investments are being made to address the next big challenge in cellular agriculture.

And now, the rest of this week’s funding news:

Food Supply Chain

TrusTrace – $6 Million: TrusTrace, a Sweden-based startup building food supply chain traceability software solutions, has raised a $6 million Series A funding round. TrusTrace uses blockchain, AI, and bots to track products as they navigate their way through the supply chain. The company claims to have 8 thousand suppliers and 250 thousand products on the platform. My guess is TrusTrace and other traceability platform players are getting lots of inbound inquiries as everyone from ingredient and component suppliers, manufacturers, and retailers are trying to figure out how to work through the great 2021 supply chain disequilibrium.

Plant-Based Food

Grounded Foods – $2.5 Million: Plant-based cheese maker Grounded Foods has announced a $2.5 million raise. The company, founded by the husband and wife team of Shaun Quade and Veronica Fil, makes cheese products with hemp seeds and cauliflower. Grounded is already in 160 different retail locations today and plans to use the funds to expand further in the US and to set up for expansion into Europe.

Ag Tech

Kuva Space – €4.2M ($4.9M): Kuva Space, a provider of realtime agricultural data using space-borne hyperspectral camera technology, has raised $4.9 million. The company plans on using the funding to launch a constellation of six-unit nano-satellites to gather imagery in the 400 to 1,100 nanometer band. The company provides data that helps farmers optimize fertilizer and irrigation needs, optimal harvesting times, and early-stage pest or plant disease detection. With its second generation satellites, the company plans to expand its carbon monitoring capabilities.

Food Waste

Orbisk – €2.4M: Orbisk, which provides professional kitchens with automated analysis of food usage and associated waste flow using machine vision and AI, has received a €2.4 million grant from the European Commission’s European Innovation Council (EIC). The data from Orbisk’s analysis allows customers to adapt processes and purchasing to better manage and reduce food waste. Orbisk won the EIC funding with a pitch for its ‘Binspector’ project, under which the company will invest in dynamic AI models to increase accuracy and rapid adaptation in international menus, as well as further development of its food management algorithms.

Fish Tech

OptoScale – $4.1m (£3m): Optoscale, which makes machine vision and sensor technologies real-time monitoring of fish farm stock, has raised £3 million led by SWEN Capital Partners. The Norway-based company says it can analyze up to 200,000 fish per day using its technology, which compares with 50 to 100 fish using traditional analysis methods. Optoscale, which currently operates in Norway, Canada, and Scotland, plans to use the money to expand operations to Australia, Chile, and Iceland.

Restaurant Tech

ResQ – $39 Million: Well that was fast. After raising $7.5 million in a June seed funding round, ResQ, which provides a software platform for managing restaurant repair and maintenance tasks, has raised a $39 million Series A. Through their platform, restaurants can request, manage, and pay for a service, as well as manage the documents for these things. ResQ also connects restaurants with a network of contractors able to perform those services. The company’s list of available services includes HVAC, refrigeration, electrical, janitorial, plumbing, pest control, grease trap cleaning, preventative maintenance, and most anything else needed to keep a restaurant kitchen up and running. Since its seed round, the company has said its customer base has grown from seven states to 36 in the US. They plan to use the funding to grow their team by 400%.

C3 – $10 Million: Virtual restaurant/host kitchen platform company C3 has raised another $10 million in strategic funding from Swiss private capital firm, Lurra Capital, just a few months after it had raised a $80 million Series B. C3 (short for Creating Culinary Communities), works with kitchen operators (host kitchens) to fulfill orders for virtual restaurant brands. As of mid-year, the company operated about 40 virtual restaurant brands. The company plans to open 1,000 virtual brand locations by year’s end and has plans to open 12,000 globally by 2023.

Food Robots

Future Acres – $1.7 Million: Farm robotics startup Future Acres has raised $1.7 million via equity crowdfunding on Seedinvest. The company makes a self-driving robot called Carry that utilizes GPS and computer vision to navigate around the field and haul up to 500 pounds of produce. The company, which has raised a little over $400 thousand in pre-seed funding, plans to use the funds for product development, payroll, marketing and operations.

Plant Jammer, TrusTrace Join Cohort 2020 of Bloomer’s Food Tech Accelerator

Plant Jammer, TrusTrace, and six other food tech startups have been selected to join the 2020 cohort of Stockholm, Sweden-based accelerator program Bloomer. The program is new, and a joint effort from supermarket chain Coop Sweden, startup investor Norrsken, and Sweden FoodTech. 

Like other food tech accelerators, much of the emphasis of the program will be on helping the chosen companies further develop products and services that contribute to a more sustainable, eco-friendly food system:

Companies who join the program must relocate to Stockholm, Sweden for a mandatory 12 weeks starting at the end of March, with an optional extension that runs through September. Programming is a combination of standard curriculum — what Bloomer calls “The Frame” — as well as more customized learning based on each individual startup’s goals and needs. According to the program’s website, participating companies receive $250 SEK against equity, mentorship opportunities, and access to Coop’s data, customers, and industry connections. 

Startups should plan to relocate to Norrsken’s coworking space in Stockholm, Norrsken House. 

Eight companies total were chose for the 2020 cohort:

  • Volta Greentech makes an algae-based feed supplement for cows that reduces their methane production by up to 80 percent.
  • Foodla is a food market app where food producers can sell their products to local communities.
  • Plant Jammer has an AI-powered platform that creates personalized recipes for users based on their diets, food preferences, and fridge contents.
  • Lunch.co is an online marketplace for work colleagues to buy and sell home-cooked lunches.
  • Leafymade makes plastic-free, 100 percent biodegradable bowls, plates, cutlery, and other items meant to replace single-use disposable products.
  • Vembla has an e-commerce platform selling groceries, household goods, and pharmaceuticals from local retailers. 
  • Grönska is building out its own AI-powered vertical farming system that grows leafy greens using hydroponics.
  • TrusTrace collects, verifies and analyses data to improve traceability across the food system.

The program kicks off March 30. Those interested in applying for future cohorts should check out the program criteria here.