The Radicle Challenge

Upcoming Challenges

Coming Soon: Radicle Protein Challenge by Syngenta to Provide $1.25m Investment Toward New Protein Technologies

In our latest Radicle Challenge, we’ve teamed up with Syngenta, a leading agriculture company helping to improve global food security sustainably, to invest in two technology companies that are transforming the future of protein. This could include new protein sources, new protein conversion technologies, or improvements to existing protein systems. Consumers globally are demanding more protein and are looking for new sources of that protein.

A $1m investment will be made in the Challenge winner and a $250k investment to the second-place winner (in addition to a custom acceleration program and access to Radicle and Syngenta’s global ag networks). The global applicant pool will be narrowed to 4-6 finalists who will participate in a Pitch Day event this Fall with our panel of judges, including Erik Fyrwald, CEO of Syngenta, and Kirk Haney, Managing Partner of Radicle Growth.

Applications open on Tuesday, April 28 and will be accepted from companies of all stages, all around the world. Do you want early access to the Challenge application before it opens to the public? Sign up below. We look forward to learning more about how you will change the world of agriculture.

Investment Competitions:

We regularly run challenges and pitch day competitions to identify early-stage companies focused on different areas of agtech and foodtech to make investments in. The winners of these challenges receive funding without program participation or re-location requirements. Here’s some information on our current and past challenges.

“These Challenges aren’t just about capital, they have the opportunity to fundamentally shift the trajectory of a company in their infancy. Winning companies will be given access to a network that a company at these stages wouldn’t typically have access to. We are looking to put capital to work in great companies that will play a role in shaping the future of food and capitalize them to success, without the requirement of taking part in a program. We look forward to accelerating the innovation of the best ideas in agricultural function.”

Kirk Haney
Managing Partner, Radicle Growth

To stay informed about when challenges open and finalist/winner announcements are made, subscribe to our mailing list.

Past Challenges

Winner

Winner Announced: March, 2020

Investment: $250k

“There is no way to tell what is in the air around us. This has impacts on human health as well as a significant unmet need in agriculture. Our technology was developed based on our founders’ background in optics and defect detection. He invented a method to use optics and light to classify particles and that was the basis for our company’s launch three years ago,” said Glenn Wanke, Chief Commercial Officer, Scanit Technologies, Inc. “The funding and agronomy expertise of Radicle and Corteva will help us scale our business and commercialize the technology, validate our efforts within the indoor horticulture and outdoor crop focus areas, bring on key talent to deliver on our product roadmap and raise follow-on capital.”

About the Challenge

Radicle Growth and Corteva teamed up on this Challenge to identify a promising agtech startup that is solving agricultural challenges with novel technology solutions and support its success. Entrepreneurs with technologies across the agricultural landscape who are solving problems with breakthrough technology solutions were invited to apply. In addition to the investment, the winner will have access to Radicle’s company-building platform and the opportunity to engage with Corteva technology leaders to help shape, validate and refine the selected growth opportunity using virtual or actual on-the-farm assessments.

Winner

Winner Announced: October 2019

Investment: $250k

“Weed resistance is a major threat to global food security and sustainability. Weeds continue to develop resistance and no longer respond to existing chemical herbicides,” said Efrat Lidor Nili, Co-CEO and Founder, WeedOUT. “The funding and collaboration with Radicle Growth provides us a huge opportunity to continue our mission to combat this issue that causes more than $40billion in global losses annually. We are honored to have been chosen as the winner of the Radicle Challenge Israel amidst a pool of strong agtech and foodtech innovators from across Israel.”

 


About the Challenge

Radicle teamed up with OurCrowd and Start-Up Nation Central on this Challenge (which was announced at the 2019 OurCrowd Global Investor Summit) to find the most promising agtech/foodtech startup in Israel. The winner of The Radicle Challenge Israel received Radicle’s first investment specifically targeted at entrepreneurs in Israel, a market showing significant growth and promise for agtech innovation.

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Winners

Winners announced: October, 2019

Investment: $1m in the growth-stage winner and $250k in the early-stage winner

“They put a lot of time into understanding what we’re doing as a company,” said Karn Manhas, founder and CEO of Terramera. “We had broad range of industry leaders serving as judges – all learning about your technology, learning about how to apply it and also giving some great feedback. We’re looking at this not just as a source of dollars but of partnerships and advice and a platform to be able to build the company from where it is to the next level is really.”

“We have some big visions and this chunk of money can help us scale our manufacturing so we can be able to ship into the market more quickly and start to grow internationally with partners,” said Karen Schuett, founder and CEO of Livestock Water Recycling. “And through our interaction with Nutrien and Radicle, we can turn this into something that really changes the game in our industry.”


About the Challenge

Radicle teamed up with Nutrien (the world’s largest provider of crop inputs, services and solutions) to transform the speed of innovation for Canadian ag and foodtech inovation. We called on Growth-Stage and Seed-Stage ag and foodtech entrepreneurs in Canada to apply for an investment. We shortlisted all of our entrants to eight finalists, who competed onsite at the Pitch Day Competition in Saskatoon October 1-2, 2019.

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Winner

Winner Announced: March, 2019

Investment: $250k

“Winning the Radicle Challenge is a major milestone validating Aromyx’s technology. While the technology has applications for a broad range of industries, agriculture is a primary focus and we see massive opportunities to disrupt current practices. Bringing a disruptive technology to an established marketplace is not easy, and we are excited to be partnering with Radicle and their network to accelerate our development efforts and find the optimal product-market fits.” Josh Silverman, Aromyx, Inc. CEO

 

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About the Challenge

For a second year, we teamed up with World Agri-Tech to host the pre-summit Pitch Day in San Francisco. Entries consisted of over 150 seed-stage Agtech and Foodtech companies. Eight early-stage technology companies were then selected to pitch their solutions to a panel of judges and an audience of high-ranking investors and agribusiness leaders

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Winner

Winner Announced: February, 2019

Investment: $250k

“Increasingly, farmers demand all-in-one solutions for their agriculture data. In response, agtech companies both large and small are quickly forming partnerships and programmatic connections between their data platforms via APIs. However, we see the vast majority of agtech companies struggling to implement and maintain their partnerships at a technical level while balancing the development of their core products. Our solution allows them to activate instant connections with their partners and remain focused on their own innovations. We’re honored to be recognized as the winner of the GPS Challenge and excited to continue our network’s expansion into North America with our new strategic partners at Radicle Growth.” G. Bailey Stockdale, Leaf Agriculture CEO

 


About the Challenge

The GPS Challenge called on agtech and foodtech startups from around the world that were taking part in an incubator or accelerator program to apply for investment. Radicle evaluated the applicants to identify and accelerate the development of the most promising pre-seed agtech and foodtech companie(s) in the world. Through investing the amount they need to be successful at the pre-seed stage, preparing them for their next round of funding, and providing them access to Radicle’s platform, Radicle helps change the trajectory of companies in their infancy.

Winner

Winner Announced: April, 2019

Investment: $1.5m

“84% of the US crop workforce tends to largely non-mechanized fruit, vegetable, and nursery production, but rising wages and a shrinking workforce are driving growers of these specialty crops to turn to robots to reduce labor needs and costs,” said Charlie Andersen, CEO and founder, Augean Robotics. “We are thrilled to have this investor support, which will allow us to accelerate the commercialization of Burro and to develop the proprietary datasets needed to enable further autonomy.”

About the Challenge

Western Growers and Radicle Growth partnered to create The Radicle Automation Challenge, a competition where AgTech automation entrepreneurs are eligible to compete for capital and exclusive access to farm acreage to pilot their technologies. This challenge was created to find and fund the best and brightest ideas from around the world to help automate agricultural functions.