Agronomics Leads Ohayo Valley's Pre-Seed Funding

RNS Number : 8969S

Agronomics Limited

19 November 2021

 

19th November 2021

Agronomics Limited

("Agronomics" or the "Company")

Agronomics Leads Ohayo Valley's

Pre-Seed Funding Round

Agronomics, the leading listed company focused on cellular agriculture, is pleased to announce today that the Company has completed a subscription of US$ 1.5 million in the form of a Simple Agreement for Future Equity ("SAFE"), in Ohayo Valley Inc ("Ohayo Valley"). The Subscription will be paid using cash from the Company's own resources.

Ohayo Valley is a cultivated meat company, initially focused on producing cultivated Wagyu ribeye steak, before expanding to other beef products. Ohayo Valley was co-founded in 2020 by Dr. Jess Krieger. Combined, the cofounding team brings 20 years of experience in the cultivated meat sector, including Jess' previous position as CSO for Artemys Foods, where she led the development of the Artemys Burger prototype.

The SAFE is expected to convert into preferred shares in Ohayo Valley at a future equity financing round of at least US$ 1.5 million, giving Agronomics an approximate equity ownership of 18.75%. Agronomics will have the right to a board seat.

Jim Mellon, co-founder and executive director of Agronomics commented:-

"Agronomics is thrilled to be supporting Ohayo Valley and in particular working with Dr. Jess Krieger, to develop and commercialise their cultivated Wagyu ribeye steak. This marks Agronomics first investment into a company focused on producing structured beef products, and is of great relevance, noting that conventional beef production is heavily carbon and resource intensive."

Dr. Jess Krieger, co-founder and CEO of Ohayo Valley added:-

"We are thrilled to work with Agronomics to achieve our mutual goal to create a sustainable and secure food system in the era of the anthropocene. The challenges facing human civilization are massive, but so are the opportunities to redesign entire industries to optimize efficiency. Consequently, we are rapidly approaching a new agricultural paradigm through radical innovation of animal products. The cultivated meat industry provides a future where the traditions, culture, and community that are essential to our identities are preserved, while simultaneously creating a more sustainable and ethical food system. We're grateful to work with Agronomics to make our shared vision of the future a reality."

About Ohayo Valley

Ohayo Valley is a cultivated beef company blending plant-based meat and cultivated meat to develop cultivated Wagyu ribeye. Although starting with Wagyu, the product portfolio will be expanded to produce all types of beef - including ground beef and other steak cuts. Ohayo Valley uses a deep tech platform for innovation, combining synthetic biology, biomanufacturing, and food engineering to create animal products, without animals.

About Agronomics

Agronomics is a leading listed alternative proteins company with a focus on cellular agriculture and cultivated meat. The Company has established a portfolio of 18 companies at the Pre-Seed to Series B stage in this rapidly advancing sector. It seeks to secure minority stakes in companies owning technologies with defensible intellectual property that offer new ways of producing food and materials with a focus on products historically derived from animals. These technologies are driving a major disruption in agriculture, offering solutions to improve sustainability, as well as addressing human health, animal welfare and environmental damage. This disruption will decouple supply chains from the environment and animals, as well as being fundamental to feeding the world's expanding population. A full list of Agronomics' portfolio companies is available at https://agronomics.im/ .

About Cellular Agriculture

Cellular Agriculture is the production of agriculture products directly from cells, as opposed to raising an animal for slaughter, or growing crops. This encompasses cell culture to produce cultivated meat and materials, and fermentation processes that harness a combination of molecular biology, synthetic biology, tissue engineering and biotechnology to massively simplify production methods in a sustainable manner.

Over the coming decades, the source of the world's food supply traditionally derived from conventional agriculture is going to change dramatically. We have already witnessed the first wave of this shift with the consumer adoption of plant-based alternative proteins but today, we are on the cusp of an even bigger wave of change. This is being facilitated by advances in cellular agriculture. This change is necessary, given scientists claims that if we maintain existing animal protein consumption patterns, then we will not meet the Paris Agreement's goal of limiting warming to 1.5 ℃

AT Kearney, a global consultancy firm, projects that cultivated meat's market share will reach 35% by 2040. This combined with the Good Food Institute's estimate that a US $1.8 trillion investment will be required in order to produce just 10% of the world's protein using this technology, means that we are on the cusp of a multi-decade flow of capital to build out manufacturing facilities. Funding in the field of cellular agriculture is accelerating, however still less than US$ 1 billion has been invested worldwide since the industry's inception in 2016.

The information contained within this announcement is deemed by the Company to constitute inside information as stipulated under the Market Abuse Regulations (EU) No. 596/2014 ('MAR'). Upon the publication of this announcement via a Regulatory Information Service ('RIS'), this inside information is now considered to be in the public domain. 

For further information please contact:

Agronomics Limited	Beaumont Cornish Limited	Cenkos Securities Plc	Peterhouse Capital Limited	TB Cardew
The Company	Nomad	Joint Broker	Joint Broker	Public Relations
Richard Reed Denham Eke	Roland Cornish James Biddle	Giles Balleny Michael Johnson	Lucy Williams Charles Goodfellow	Ed Orlebar Joe McGregor
[phone] [e-mail]	[phone]	[phone]	[phone]	[phone] [phone] [e-mail]

 

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