Disclosure: AFN is official media partner to GROW, which is backed by AFN’s parent company AgFunder.
Silicon Valley VC firm AgFunder and Singapore-based ecosystem builder GROW are accepting applications for the third edition of the GROW Impact Accelerator – their unique program aimed at commercializing innovation that can boost sustainability and resilience across the world’s agrifood value chains.
The 20-week accelerator, backed by AgFunder’s GROW Impact Fund, provides teams with the support they need to scale up rapidly and create lasting positive change on a global scale.
Participating startups will receive investment of up to $100,000 in cash and $100,000 in-kind. Dependent on Covid-19 travel restrictions, the program will be delivered in hybrid format, in-person and virtually from GROW headquarters.
Applicants should have a minimum viable product, be well on the way to establishing product-market fit, and be operating in at least one market. The GROW Impact Accelerator is focused on technologies and solutions that allow for scalability while delivering tangible impact at either an environmental or social level. Areas of particular interest include:
- Biotech and digitalization to advance sustainable agriculture;
- Circular economies (eg, sustainable materials and closed-loop production systems);
- Climate-smart agriculture and aquaculture (technologies for carbon emissions reduction, regenerative agriculture, water use);
- Alternative proteins, innovative foods, and novel ingredients;
- Food waste valorization and mitigation;
- Supply chain rationalization;
- Technologies to support smallholder farmers (eg, robotics, decision support, chemical reduction, financial inclusion).
Nineteen companies have graduated from the GROW Impact Accelerator since its first cohort launched in 2019, cumulatively raising over $30 million of funding to date.
Here’s what a few of our alumni have to say about the program:
“The GROW team’s dedication to help their portfolio companies succeed is felt in [everything] they did… We also finished the programme with two collaborations with other portfolio companies.”
Helga Angelina Tjahjadi, co-founder and CEO, Green Rebel Foods
“A great degree of intentionality around innovation-building, deep social capital within the agrifood sector, and the backing of the world’s most reputable agrifoodtech venture firm: these are the fundamental values we got from [the GROW Impact Accelerator]. Every startup needs that inflection point in their path to growth, and we achieved that when Mayani became a part of this accelerator.”
JT Solis, co-founder and CEO, Mayani
“[As a result of the programme] we’ve realigned our business model [and] we’ve refined our pitch, and with that feel that our narrative as a company is clearer and less technical… The deep-dive on impact was a worthwhile exercise to understand so much more than the impact of our core technology, and gives us a much more rounded understanding of our impact as a company.”
Illtud Dunsford, co-founder and CEO, Cellular Agriculture
