Rockstart is an early-stage, hands-on impact investor that empowers purpose-driven founders to drive positive change across three domains: Energy, AgriFood, and Emerging Technologies. We invest early-stage, providing not just capital but also access to markets, expertise, and community by connecting founders with co-investors, mentors, partners, and corporates.   Rockstart has invested in more than 350 startups and its alumni value to date is more than $1.7bn. Rockstart is an international team of 40+ professionals dedicated to empowering purpose-driven founders to become scalable and drive positive change on a global scale. Rockstart has notable exits such as Wercker, Bouw7, iClinic, and in 2021, 3D Hubs and Brincr. The company has offices in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, Copenhagen, Denmark and Bogota, Colombia.

Rockstart

Vaekstfonden – The Danish Growth Fund – is the Danish state's investment fund. We strive to improve access to risk capital to enable Danish businesses to innovate, and to generate growth and new jobs. In close collaboration with banks and domestic and international private investors, we finance companies from all sectors nation-wide. We can accompany you for the entire journey – from your company’s infancy through growth phases to expansion abroad and even to an initial public offering.

Vaekstfonden

VÅR Ventures help founders create sustainable impact.

VÅR Ventures

Pollen Street Capital is an independent alternative investment management company, focused on investing in businesses in the financial and business services sectors to drive business transformation and investment performance. It was founded in 2013 by Lindsey McMurray, and now operates across private equity and credit strategies on behalf of investors, which include major pension funds, asset managers, banks, and family offices from across the globe. Pollen Street Capital has offices in London and New York, with a team of 70+ professionals working across both locations. Pollen Street Capital seeks to invest in high quality businesses operating in specialist markets, particularly working with entrepreneurial and driven management teams who share their values and philosophy, namely to build businesses that deliver market-leading products and services to their customers in order to create long-term sustainable success. The firm utilises its vast experience across its team to assist its partner companies take full advantage of opportunities to build high-growth, sustainable businesses that deliver profoundly to their customers within specified markets. The company invests in sectors which have the ambition and aspiration to be at the leading edge of change and maximise opportunities within the ever-growing landscape of its field. Pollen Street Capital works alongside partners with strong core attributes and a sound foundation, supporting them and their management teams with valuable expertise and capital to propel growth. Pollen Street has a proven skill to identify trends and changing customer behaviours and to target investments with a clear distinguished approach in specialist areas. They look in particular at high growth lending, insurance, wealth, payments, technologies, as well as various other financial service areas. They are also committed to responsible investing, particularly ensuring that investments today will have a positive effect on people and the planet for many years to come.  Pollen Street are a progressive partner, who are capable of pushing boundaries to deliver on sustainable business. The Pollen Street Capital team sets the bar high, bringing specialist knowledge and best practice to the complex and changing environment of the financial and businesses service sector. They offer a broad skillset that covers analytical, technical, strategic, and operational capabilities. In a world where business transformation and digital development is fundamental, Pollen Street can anticipate this kind of change and drive growth. The firm’s system of transformation accelerates change and amplifies success.

Pollen Street Capital

Novo Holdings is a holding company specializing in life science investors with a focus on creating long-term value.

Novo Holdings

Einar Willumsen is a manufacturer and supplier of flavour solutions for national and international beverage and food producing industries.

Einar Willumsen

Denmark's Export and Investment Fund (EIFO) serves as a single point of contact for Danish firms seeking risk-tolerant government finance. We aspire to help successful enterprises that can expand the Danish economy and green the world on a daily basis, guided by professionalism and an international perspective.

Export and Investment Fund

European Circular Bioeconomy Fund invest and partner with entrepreneurs to accelerate late-stage circular bioeconomy companies.

European Circular Bioeconomy Fund

Reduced

Reduced develops natural flavor enhancers from upcycled produce.

Based in Denmark, Reduced uses fermentation technology to develop natural flavor enhancers from rejected produce. Founded in 2020, the company was able to take four products to market—vegetable, veal, chicken, and shellfish stock—within its first year of operations. Upon the&nbsp;company’s pre-seed funding round in July 2021, it reported that it was building a production facility for its new line of natural flavor enhancers and expects to begin mass distribution of its existing upcycled products.&nbsp;The Copenhagen facility was operational in June 2022. As of&nbsp;October 2024, the company’s product is available across 47 Irma grocery stores.&nbsp;

Tech solutions for achieving global anti-wastage targets

Food Waste

REDUCED Secures €8 Million in Series A to Accelerate Growth and Market Expansion

Based in Denmark, Reduced uses fermentation technology to develop natural flavor enhancers from rejected produce. Founded in 2020, the company was able to take four products to market—vegetable, veal, chicken, and shellfish stock—within its first year of operations. Upon the&nbsp;company’s pre-seed funding round in July 2021, it reported that it was building a production facility for its new line of natural flavor enhancers and expects to begin mass distribution of its existing upcycled products.&nbsp;The Copenhagen facility was operational in June 2022. As of&nbsp;October 2024, the company’s product is available across 47 Irma grocery stores.&nbsp;Key customers and partnershipsAs of October 2024,&nbsp;Reduced had collaborated with Danish food and agriculture companies including DANAEG, Kannegaarden, Himmerlandskod, Blue Lobster, Balkan Berries, Tvilling Fisk, Nordisk Tang, and Convi Foods to source excess produce. Reduced sells to restaurants and foodservice companies as well as to consumers via Danish grocers.&nbsp;

Apeel Sciences is a California-based food technology company that produces edible coatings made of plant materials that extend the lifetime of fruits by 2x–3x to prevent food wastage in regions where refrigeration is scarce.&nbsp;The coatings are intended for use on fruits and vegetables, with a primary focus on avocados, apples, mangos, cucumbers, and citrus fruits.&nbsp;According to the company, US retailers that used Apeel experienced a 50% reduction in waste alongside a 5%–10% growth in sales on average. As of&nbsp;April 2024, Apeel Sciences reported to have saved&nbsp;over&nbsp;60 million pieces of produce from going to waste at retail stores by partnering with small family-owned farmers, local organic growers, grocery stores, and large food brands.&nbsp;As of October&nbsp;2024, the company was offering its solution to a network of 30 suppliers and 40 retailers across eight countries, including the US, UK, Spain, Netherlands, and Kenya. The company focuses on expanding its market presence across North America and the EU.In May 2020, Apeel announced plans to expand to Sub-Saharan Africa, Central, and South America—all regions where food wastage was increasing.&nbsp;Following this, Apeel expanded to Sub-Saharan Africa in 2022 and began its expansion to South America in 2024.In May 2021, Apeel Sciences acquired&nbsp;the&nbsp;startup Impact Vision for an undisclosed amount. Impact Vision’s technology allows suppliers to see inside their fresh produce and ultimately reduce post-harvest loss and optimize distribution while continuing to extend shelf life.&nbsp;Key customers and partnerships&nbsp;Apeel has partnered with various distributors for the distribution of its avocados, including The Kroger Company in September 2018 for Cincinnati, Calavo Growers in January 2021, and Nature’s Pride for Europe in March 2021.&nbsp;The company also collaborated with Topline Farms in February 2023 for the development of the Apeel-Protected Mini Cucumber and licensed its coating technology to Limoneira in May 2023 for use on lemons.&nbsp;

Apeel Sciences

Shelf Engine provides demand forecasting tools,&nbsp;which leverage AI and machine learning, for perishable food items to reduce inefficiencies in the ordering system and minimize overall costs. According to Shelf Engine, more than 30% of highly perishable foods in grocery stores such as meat and vegetables expire before the sell-by date. Shelf Engine’s scan-based trade (SBT) technology guarantees sales and pays for any items that remain unsold. Via the SBT, Shelf Engine manages orders, pays vendors, and only charges the retailer for what sells while still paying suppliers for their full order and increasing its accuracy over time. Shelf generates revenue by charging a markup on the product from the vendor to the retailer.As of October 2024, Shelf Engine operated in more than 3,000 grocery stores and claimed to increase profit margins by more than 50% by reducing food waste by as much as 32%.&nbsp;Shelf Engine also reported that it prevented 5.2 million lbs of food wastage, decreased 8,200 tons of CO2, and saved 500 million gallons of water.Key customers and partnershipsIn January 2024, Shelf Engine partnered with Dollar General to implement fully automated AI-powered ordering for produce, aiming to enhance inventory management and reduce food waste across Dollar General's stores. This collaboration would leverage Shelf Engine's technology to optimize ordering processes and improve the freshness of perishable items.Shelf Engine also worked with supermarket and grocery chains Whole Foods, Target, Kroger, Walmart, Ralphs, Harmons, and Bi‑Rite to manage orders and reduce food waste.

Shelf Engine

Afresh began as a research project in 2017 to develop AI-powered software that optimizes the entire food supply chain. Specifically, the company offers an in-store solution for grocery stores that applies artificial intelligence to manage the freshness of food. According to the company, the implementation of its technology has led to a 25%–45% reduction of in-store food waste and increased gross margin of fresh produce sales by 4 percentage points. The company generates revenue under a SaaS model. In&nbsp;<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/16835">March 2023,</a> the company expanded into fresh departments, including meat, seafood, deli, and food service.As of&nbsp;October 2024, the company’s technology was deployed across 3,000 stores in 40 states in the US and it reported that it was able to triple its customer base in 2021.&nbsp;Afresh also reported that it prevented 44 million lbs of food wastage as of 2024 while reducing 24 million kg of CO2 emissions and saving 886 million gallons of water.Key customers and partnershipsSome of Afresh's key customers include Fresh Thyme Market, WinCo Foods, and Heinen’s. In 2019, the company also reported that it had established partnerships with three US grocery chains, each with more than 100 stores in operation.&nbsp;&nbsp;The company also collaborated with Bashas’ Supermarkets Inc. (a chain of grocery stores based in North America with over 100 stores) in September 2021 and New Season Market (a chain of 19 privately owned grocery stores) in October 2021 to pilot the “Afresh AI-driven software solution” at selected stores.In December 2022, Afresh partnered with SpartanNash to pilot the AI-powered Afresh platform at 10 of SpartanNash’s Family Fare grocery stores.&nbsp;&nbsp;In&nbsp;<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/15786">January 2023</a>, Afresh and Albertsons Companies announced the completion of an enterprise rollout of the Afresh predictive ordering and inventory management platform.&nbsp;Afresh also partnered with Albertsons Companies again in October 2024 for the launch of Afresh DC Forecasts, where Albertsons was its first customer.

AFresh

UK-based Winnow Solutions identifies and measures waste in commercial kitchens. The company records the reason for the waste, calculates the value of the wasted food, and keeps track of this data in the cloud. The company’s self-titled product shares technology with autonomous vehicles, using cameras to record and learn about food being wasted and calculate the financial and environmental cost of this discarded food. Winnow Vision also provides a Waste Monitor solution to help kitchen staff track how and what food is wasted to adjust their spending on food ingredients and eliminate overproduction.As of October 2024, Winnow Solutions reported that it had annually saved over 50 million meals, reduced 87,000 tons of CO2, and saved USD 70 million for customers.Key customers and partnershipsWinnow’s customers include the catering company&nbsp;<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/5386">ISS</a> and hotels such as Accor, Fairmont, The Westin, Four Seasons, and Hilton Tokyo Bay.&nbsp;In September 2023, Winnow Solutions partnered with Ne’ma, the UAE’s National Food Loss and Waste Initiative, to support Ne’ma with data, benchmarking, and best practices for the hotels, restaurants, and catering (HoReCa) sector.&nbsp; Following this, Winnow was selected as a preferred food waste management vendor by Dayblink GPO in November 2023.

Winnow Solutions

Hazel Technologies is a United States Department of Agriculture (USDA)-funded technology company that develops packaging that releases vapors that slow the aging process and prevent fungus or decay. Its solution is claimed to double the shelf life of produce. Hazel operates a B2B business that targets large enterprises. The company has reported treating&nbsp;5 billion lbs of produce as of October 2024, saving about 4 billion lbs from going bad. The company has a target to save one billion&nbsp;lbs of produce from going to waste by the end of 2021. Hazel operates in&nbsp;13 countries&nbsp;across the US, South America, and Europe, as of October 2024.&nbsp;Hazel works with around 250 food service and produce companies including the likes of Sysco, Mission Produce, Zespri, Calavo, and Oppy.&nbsp;As of October 2024, the company offers Hazel Endure, its antimicrobial packaging for berries, grapes, and other fruit, which uses an anti-fungal pad to extend the shelf life and quality of fruits and other produce.Key customers and partnershipsHazel Technologies has formed several partnerships to reduce food waste and extend the shelf life of various produce. These included collaborations with Mission Produce for avocados in July 2020, Migiva Group for grape trials in March 2021, Specialty Crop Company for figs and Symms Fruit for apples in May 2021, Oppy and Brar Farms for California-grown table grapes in July 2022, and Kliewer Farms for kiwifruit in November 2022.

Hazel Technologies

Startups that prevent food wastage by prolonging the lifetime of food or better managing food production through the supply chain. Companies that develop products such as sanitizers, containers, and machines that allow food to stay fresh longer are included here. Startups that develop algorithms to determine food preservation strategies are also included.

These startups ensure work to reroute surplus food to different sets of end-users including charity organizations and consumers seeking discounted items. This segment mainly consists of on-demand online platforms that connect producers, retailers, and restaurants with consumers via mobile app.

Startups that recycle food waste for industrial uses such as soil enrichment.

Startups that recycle food waste into edible food and beverages.

Solutions that keep food waste out of landfills

Recycling and upcycling food waste to keep them out of landfills

IoT-enabled waste prevention techniques for purposes such as longer shelf-life and inventory management

Waste prevention analysis platforms use AI/ML

<div>
 
 Reduced, a Danish startup that creates natural flavor enhancers from upcycled food, has obtained EUR 6 million (~USD 6.5 million) in funding. The lead investors were Novo Holdings and Einar Willumsen, and they were accompanied by existing investors EIFO and Rockstart Agrifood.
 With this funding, the company intends to enhance its technology platform, expand its savory ingredient range, boost production capacity, and improve sales and marketing initiatives.

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Reduced

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