Investee Company Update: Good Dog Food
4 May 2023
Agronomics Limited
("Agronomics" or the "Company")
Investee Company Update: Good Dog Food Announces Successful £3.6 Million Seed Financing Round
Agronomics (ANIC:LSE), the leading listed company focused on the field of cellular agriculture, is pleased to announce that the Company has invested £1 million ("the Subscription") in Good Dog Food Limited ("GDF") as part of its £3.6 million Seed financing round. The Subscription was paid using cash from the Company's own resources and will result in Agronomics holding 8,768 shares in GDF representing 42.4% of the company. Investors joining this latest round of financing include Siddhi Capital, a prominent and highly respected investor in innovative food products and technologies, together with a number of private individuals. Jim Mellon, an Executive Director of Agronomics and a 2.99% shareholder in GDF, also participated in the fundraise, with a £300,000 investment.
GDF is focused on developing cultivated pet food, with the goal of creating a novel range of products from ingredients that should appeal to pet owners who value sustainable, slaughter-free, antibiotic-free, high quality nutritious food for their pets. Meat provides essential nutrients for companion animals, however, when produced from livestock or fish, it is a major driver of climate change and often results in the overexploitation of natural resources. Food for companion animals accounts for almost a quarter of meat produced in the US, and in the US alone it is estimated dog and cat food is responsible for 65 million tonnes of CO2-equivalent methane and nitrous oxide.
In March 2022 Agronomics launched GDF, investing £150,000 in the Founder's round. Subject to audit, Agronomics will be carrying this investment at £4.96 million, including an unrealised gain of £3.81 million.
Jim Mellon, Executive Director of Agronomics said:-
" By creating sustainable, ethical meat from cells, Good Dog Food are able to replace the 20% of meat and fish produced globally for use in pet food.
As a dog owner, I have been looking for high-quality alternatives to traditional meat to provide to my dogs. Good Dog Food will do exactly that. It is even more exciting to know that Good Dog Food may accelerate the introduction of cultivated meat to the broader public "
Owen Ensor, GDF's CEO, adds:-
"We're extremely excited to work with Agronomics. Their industry-leading expertise and advice have been fundamental to the ongoing success of Good Dog Food. With their support, we aim to bring some of the first ever cultivated meat products to market and, ultimately, help transform our food system into one that is both sustainable and ethical. Developing products for pet food is the natural starting point."
About Good Dog Food
Good Dog Food aims to develop the first ever cultivated meat products for the £80B pet food industry. They will create meat that is truly healthy, ethical, and sustainable whilst being free from antibiotics and steroids. Given the more straightforward regulation for pet food, Good Dog Food aims to commercialise product faster than cultivated meat for human food. To date they have removed all animal components from their manufacturing process, have developed prototype products, and built relationships with leading pet food manufacturers and retailers. Find out more at www.gooddogfood.com.
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 over 20 companies 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 and be 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 $1.8 trillion investment will be required in order to produce just 10% of the world's protein using this technology, means that we are on the cusp of a multi-decade flow of capital to build out manufacturing facilities. Funding in the field of cellular agriculture is accelerating, however, still, less than US$ 5 billion has been invested worldwide since the industry's inception in 2016.
For further information please contact:
|
Agronomics Limited |
Beaumont Cornish Limited |
Canaccord Genuity Limited |
Cenkos Securities Plc |
Peterhouse Capital Limited |
|
The Company |
Nomad |
Joint Broker |
Joint Broker |
Joint Broker |
|
Richard Reed Denham Eke |
Roland Cornish James Biddle |
Andrew Potts Harry Rees Alex Aylen (Head of Equities) |
Giles Balleny Michael Johnson |
Lucy Williams Charles Goodfellow |
|
+44 (0) 1624 639396 |
+44 (0) 207 628 3396 |
+44 (0) 207 523 8000 |
+44 (0) 207 397 8900 |
+44 (0) 207 469 0936 |
RNS may use your IP address to confirm compliance with the terms and conditions, to analyse how you engage with the information contained in this communication, and to share such analysis on an anonymised basis with others as part of our commercial services. For further information about how RNS and the London Stock Exchange use the personal data you provide us, please see our Privacy Policy.
Latest directors dealings
- 4 hours ago Johnson Matthey
- 5 hours ago Galliford Try
- 5 hours ago Galliford Try
- 5 hours ago Centrica
- 6 hours ago Smith & Nephew