The Better Meat Co.: Paul Shapiro shares how to get funded in 2025

Investment Climate Podcast: Fundraising Playbooks From Food Tech CEOs and VCs 

In this podcast series, Alex Shandrovsky interviews investors about benchmarks for funding Alt Proteins in 2025 and uncovers the investment playbooks of successful Climate Tech CEOs and Leading VCs.

Podcast Host Alex Shandrovksy is a strategic advisor to numerous global food tech accelerators and companies, including alternative proteins and cellular agriculture leaders. His focus is on investor relations and post-raise scale for agrifood tech companies. This podcast is syndicated through our media partners, Foodtech Weekly and Vegconomist.

Episode 45: The Better Meat Co.: Paul Shapiro shares how to get funded in 2025

This episode features Paul Shapiro, CEO of The Better Meat Co., who just closed a new funding round in one of the toughest markets alternative protein has ever seen. Paul shares how the company weathered years of IP litigation, kept advancing with patents and regulatory wins, and built long-term trust with investors like Steve Jurvetson (Future Ventures) and Rob Reid (Resilience Reserve) — relationships nurtured since 2021 that finally culminated in a Series A lead in 2025. He breaks down The Better Meat Co.’s pragmatic strategy: positioning as an ingredient supplier to the $1T meat industry rather than a branded CPG, focusing on hybrid meat products that reduce animal use at scale, and pioneering cost-competitive mycoprotein through continuous fermentation. The conversation dives into investor management, transparency in board meetings, the importance of educating backers on biotech realities, and the values-driven yet pragmatic mission of building a truly scalable sustainability solution.

Key Facts The Better Meat Co.:

• Goal: To make meat that's better for the planet, animals, and public health.
• Recently  raised $31 million in Series A, co-led by Future Ventures and Resilience Reserve.

Alex’s Top Findings:

1. Long-Term Investor Relationships Pay Off. The Better Meat Co. co-leads (Future Ventures & Resilience Reserve) were cultivated for years, with initial support via a convertible note. “Bruce Friedrich  from The Good Food Institute, many years ago, probably around 2021, introduced me to Rob Reid … he then introduced me to Steve Jurvetson.  They did do a convertible note, which was smaller than what we just did, but they did a convertible note at the end of 2021, and then they made their series A investment in 2025."
2. Transparency and Education Are Critical in Board Meetings. The Better Meat Co. uses board time to expose challenges and teach investors technical fundamentals..  " We're highly transparent. We do not mask any bad things. We never wanted to be a board meeting where we're just merely informing the board of what we're doing, and that's it.  It's not our duty merely to inform them. We want to solicit their ideas, like they are there not just to govern the company, they're there to help. Guide what we are doing."
3. Balancing Mission and Pragmatism. As a long-time vegan, Paul faced criticism for pursuing hybrid meat but stresses pragmatic impact.  " I had people criticizing me in podcasts and blogs, unfriending me on Facebook over this.   I've been a vegan for about 32 years, and I'd be thrilled if more people wanted to eat that way. But I'm also a pragmatist, and I recognize again that meat demand is going up, not down. People like to live in a bubble and think that the world is going the way that they want it to. In reality, it is going in the opposite way. Meat demand is up; it's at an all-time high."

Prefer: Jake Berber shares how to get funded in 2025

Investment Climate Podcast: Fundraising Playbooks From Food Tech CEOs and VCs 

In this podcast series, Alex Shandrovsky interviews investors about benchmarks for funding Alt Proteins in 2025 and uncovers the investment playbooks of successful Climate Tech CEOs and Leading VCs.

Podcast Host Alex Shandrovksy is a strategic advisor to numerous global food tech accelerators and companies, including alternative proteins and cellular agriculture leaders. His focus is on investor relations and post-raise scale for agrifood tech companies. This podcast is syndicated through our media partners, Foodtech Weekly and Vegconomist.

Episode 44: Prefer: Jake Berber shares how to get funded in 2025

This episode of the Investor Climate Podcast features a return conversation with Jake Berber, co-founder and CEO of Prefer, who just closed an oversubscribed $4.2M pre-A round to future-proof climate-threatened crops starting with coffee and cocoa. Jake walks through the full fundraising playbook—from building a transparent non-NDA data room and leveraging warm intros, to overcoming MOU skepticism with conservative revenue modeling and positioning IP licensing as a capital-light growth driver. He shares candid lessons from six months of 20+ investor calls per week, a 1.5% conversion rate, and how the round came together with co-leads At One Ventures and Chancery Hill Capital. The discussion blends tactical fundraising insights with founder resilience, showing what it takes to raise in today’s tougher climate tech market.

Key Facts Prefer:

• Goal: To future-proof food & beverage, starting with coffee and chocolate.
• Recently closed an oversubscribed $4.2M pre-A round co-led by At One Ventures and Chancery Hill Capital.

Alex’s Top Findings:

1. Funnel Management: Brutal Conversion Rates. Out of 500+ reachouts, only three checks closed (~1.5%). Jake emphasizes grit and volume. "We had 200 venture capital funds, CVCs, EVCS, government agencies, and family offices in our CRM that we had spoken with. So we had over 200 different entities that we spoke with that were interested in raising money and took a call with us. In terms of people who reached out, I'm guessing 500 plus. I would say 50% of them opted into a non NDA data room and 20 20% opted into the full NDA data room. "
2. Warm Intros Are Non-Negotiable. Fundraising = sales. Investors judge founders by their ability to secure warm introductions. " I think that investors want to see that you are a good enough salesperson to get a warm introduction to them. I bring it back to sales because what we've learned in our industry, being a B2B food tech company, is that a warm introduction to a customer is infinitely more effective than a cold reach out to a customer. And so good investors know that if you're able to get a warm introduction to me, the investor, that means that you can get a warm introduction to the customer. If you can get warm introductions to customers, you are a better salesperson, and in turn, you have a chance of having better revenue as a company. So I bring it back to just showing a skillset of being able to get connected with people. I'm sure there's data around a higher rate of first call via warm introduction versus cold. I'm sure that's out there, but I don't have exact numbers on it."
3. Data Room Strategy: Radical Transparency. Jake used a non-NDA data room with nearly everything except customer names and IP details to accelerate diligence. "The only difference in our NDA data room versus non-NDA data room is customer names and IP information. We keep our forward-looking financial model in there. We keep in MOU amounts, but we redact all contracts of names or anything. So you can still see the structure of the MOUs, that there's a signature on there that they're legitimate

Loopworm: Ankit Bagaria shares how to get funded in 2025

Investment Climate Podcast: Fundraising Playbooks From Food Tech CEOs and VCs 

In this podcast series, Alex Shandrovsky interviews investors about benchmarks for funding Alt Proteins in 2025 and uncovers the investment playbooks of successful Climate Tech CEOs and Leading VCs.

Podcast Host Alex Shandrovksy is a strategic advisor to numerous global food tech accelerators and companies, including alternative proteins and cellular agriculture leaders. His focus is on investor relations and post-raise scale for agrifood tech companies. This podcast is syndicated through our media partners, Foodtech Weekly and Vegconomist.

Episode 43: Loopworm: Ankit Bagaria shares how to get funded in 2025

In this episode, I talk with Ankit Alok Bagaria, co-founder and CEO of Loopworm, a Bangalore-based biotech startup using insect-based systems to produce high-value proteins for nutrition, diagnostics, and biopharma. Ankit shares how Loopworm raised a $3.25M pre-Series A round led by WaterBridge Ventures and Japan’s Enrission India Capital, and how they built investor conviction around a new recombinant protein platform—while continuing to scale a profitable animal nutrition business. We dive into using silkworms as living bioreactors, building hyper-prepared data rooms, navigating biotech objections in India’s VC landscape, and why Loopworm is designed as a long-term insect biotech platform—not just an insect protein startup.

Key Facts Loopworm:

• Goal: To redefine how industries approach nutrition, health, and wellness by maximising the value of insects across various applications.
• Recently raised $3.4M in seed funding led by WaterBridge Ventures and Enrission India Capital.

Alex’s Top Findings:

1. Existing Investors Can Be the Best Lead Investors. Loopworm’s pre-Series A was led by WaterBridge Ventures, an existing investor who doubled down because of strong business performance and a promising new vertical. ” So we already knew Water Bridge Ventures from before. We have been in touch with them for the last three years. They also participated and invested in our seed round. So they have doubled down in this round with us, which shows a lot of confidence from existing investors. Obviously, they were much more aware in terms of the progress at Loopworm in terms of what we were trying to achieve, the major breakthrough that we got with our recombinant protein platform. That is where I think that confidence came in, where they straightaway gave us a commitment like when we started raising our funds in this round, and then we got a hold of new investors coming in as well.”
2. Cold Outreach Can Land Strategic Investors. Japanese investor was sourced via a short LinkedIn message emphasizing traction and capital already committed. "I saw news… fund is actively looking at investments in India… reached out on LinkedIn. Japan can be a great market for us, since we work with silkworms. I essentially reached out to them on LinkedIn, stating, ‘I am raising a $3 million round with $1.5 million in commitments. Happy to connect,’ they replied, ‘Glad to get connected. Let's get on a call. Looks interesting.’”
3. Data Room & Preparedness Shortened Due Diligence. Ankit prepared questions, hyperlinked Q&A in Google Drive, plus factory and process videos, and accelerated the close. “ From our last seed round of investment, what I learned was that it's better to be prepared with all the data rooms, FAQs, etc. So I can essentially predict the hundred questions that an investor would ask me and create supporting documents for them. From a financial due diligence and a legal due diligence perspective, even from an ESG due diligence perspective, we had already created data rooms. We even prepared five videos.” 

Koppie: Daan Raemdonck shares how to get funded in 2025

Investment Climate Podcast: Fundraising Playbooks From Food Tech CEOs and VCs 

In this podcast series, Alex Shandrovsky interviews investors about benchmarks for funding Alt Proteins in 2025 and uncovers the investment playbooks of successful Climate Tech CEOs and Leading VCs.

Podcast Host Alex Shandrovksy is a strategic advisor to numerous global food tech accelerators and companies, including alternative proteins and cellular agriculture leaders. His focus is on investor relations and post-raise scale for agrifood tech companies. This podcast is syndicated through our media partners, Foodtech Weekly and Vegconomist.

Episode 42: Koppie: Daan Raemdonck shares how to get funded in 2025

In this episode, I speak with Daan Raemdonck, founder and CEO of Koppie, a Belgium-based startup developing fermented coffee alternatives to help safeguard the future of the coffee ritual. Daan shares how Koppie raised its pre-seed round led by Nucleus Capital, with follow-on investment from Mudcake, Rockstar, and angel investors—all through warm intros while in stealth. We unpack how Q-grader testing validated their product against market alternatives, why they pivoted their go-to-market during the raise, and how early grant funding in Belgium helped extend runway pre-fundraise. Daan also opens up about valuation benchmarking, handling objections around market history, and the mindset that helped him stay emotionally grounded through the fundraising journey.

Key Facts Koppie:

• Goal: To help safeguard the future of the coffee ritual.
• Recently raised its pre-seed round led by Nucleus Capital, with follow-on investment from Mudcake, Rockstar, and angel investors.

Alex’s Top Findings:

1. Warm Intros Are Everything in Stealth. Koppie raised its pre-seed round entirely through warm introductions while still in stealth mode. ”Almost everything has been a warm introduction. So I think there have been very few, especially since we're pre-seed. So we were actually in stealth. It doesn't happen in stealth mode to have a non-war intro that leads to something. All of our investors, whether it was Mudcake or Rockstar, have all been warm introductions by someone else who then either invested as an angel or just wasn't part of the round in the end.
2. Outperformed Competitors in Independent Taste Test. A blind test by certified Q-graders validated the product, helping build conviction internally and with investors. " We had an independent test done over the summer of 2024, and in that independent test, we outperformed all the alternatives we could source in Europe. That's for me the reason to stop all activities and to say, ‘okay, now I'm going all in on this,’ what used to be at that point, just a random idea.”
3. Reverse Due Diligence on Investors. Daan assessed investor quality based on how well they challenged the team during early calls. “ The first call is where you're trying to pitch your startup, but you're also listening to the questions they ask. Unanimously with all the investors, we're now on board. We found the interview to be interesting as well. What is also interesting is that we felt that they asked the right questions, in-depth questions, and they understood what we were trying to do. They asked the right follow-up questions without being anal about it. But they challenged our thinking, and they pushed us forward during the interview. Those are the investors you want.” 

Alba Health: Eleonora Cavani shares how to get funded in 2025

Investment Climate Podcast: Fundraising Playbooks From Food Tech CEOs and VCs 

In this podcast series, Alex Shandrovsky interviews investors about benchmarks for funding Alt Proteins in 2025 and uncovers the investment playbooks of successful Climate Tech CEOs and Leading VCs.

Podcast Host Alex Shandrovksy is a strategic advisor to numerous global food tech accelerators and companies, including alternative proteins and cellular agriculture leaders. His focus is on investor relations and post-raise scale for agrifood tech companies. This podcast is syndicated through our media partners, Foodtech Weekly and Vegconomist.

Episode 40: Alba Health: Eleonora Cavani shares how to get funded in 2025

In this episode, I speak with Eleonora Cavani, founder and CEO of Alba Health, a Sweden-based startup on a mission to prevent chronic disease by improving childhood gut health. Eleonora shares how Alba raised €5M — including a €2.5M round led by Unconventional Ventures — and how the company combines microbiome testing, nutritional coaching, and parent education to help families build long-term health foundations. We explore her scientific moat, regulatory strategy, and how she used LinkedIn and public speaking to build investor trust. Eleonora also reflects on the emotional side of fundraising and what it means to lead with purpose.

Key Facts Alba Health:

• Goal: To prevent chronic disease by improving childhood gut health
• Recently raised €5M, including a €2.5M round led by Unconventional Ventures.

Alex’s Top Findings:

1. From Cold Start to 600 Conversations. Nora’s pre-seed journey involved reaching out cold to 250 investors and speaking with 600 people in her first year—building trust one connection at a time. " Our first round was very different, very different. I went out to 250 investors, so that was a lot of work and very different. The second one was much easier. Completely different in the first round. I started out cold. Now looking back, it was a lot about developing the idea, developing the business model, and the plan, and also fundraising. The first year, I really spent it meeting so many people. I spoke to 600 people and I spoke to anybody, not only investors, anybody that had something around this topic, anybody that was interested in the topic, anyone that could help, anyone that resonated, that somehow liked what we're doing.”
2. How to Win Intros: Be Someone Worth Introducing. Rather than asking directly, Eleonora focused on being authentic, valuable, and compelling—so others wanted to introduce her. "I saw many people giving me introductions and inviting me to more and more things over time. And I think that's what led to that one introduction, but it led to many other introductions as well. So my last round was very atypical, and our lead investor was our customer. We got introduced by a friend, and actually another investor who followed our journey over time. She has helped me a lot by making introductions. I didn't ask for it. I believe that they talked to the two of them, and it was a catch-up between two investors, talking about who is around and who is interesting, and I believe Unconventional Ventures is looking for companies that have big potential, have an impact, but also have unconventional founders in a sense. She pointed to me and she made the introduction without me asking. ”
3. Valuation: Let the Market Decide. Rather than anchoring the conversation, Eleonora lets investor demand determine valuation—betting on interest over control. “ I never decide that [valuation]. If investors ask me about valuation, I say that they will be better equipped to decide that. I would say the way I see my job as a founder is to create a market around me, my company, and the fundraising. So I want to create extreme intere

Tastewise: Alon Chen shares how to get funded in 2025

Investment Climate Podcast: Fundraising Playbooks From Food Tech CEOs and VCs 

In this podcast series, Alex Shandrovsky interviews investors about benchmarks for funding Alt Proteins in 2025 and uncovers the investment playbooks of successful Climate Tech CEOs and Leading VCs.

Podcast Host Alex Shandrovksy is a strategic advisor to numerous global food tech accelerators and companies, including alternative proteins and cellular agriculture leaders. His focus is on investor relations and post-raise scale for agrifood tech companies. This podcast is syndicated through our media partners, Foodtech Weekly and Vegconomist.

Episode 40: Tastewise: Alon Chen shares how to get funded in 2025

In this episode, I speak with Alon Chen, co-founder and CEO of Tastewise, a generative AI platform powering sales and marketing for the food and beverage industry. Alon shares how Tastewise raised a $50M Series B led by Telus, and breaks down their playbook for building deep investor relationships, bridging rounds with strategics, and maintaining valuation discipline. We talk about the difference between selling AI and selling food tech, the importance of multithreaded fundraising conversations, and why founder community matters more than any book when navigating hard decisions.

Key Facts Tastewise:

• Goal: To  help the food industry to  digitize and automate their go-to market from accepting new products, to creating and generating more demand for their products, to enabling their sales team to be more successful in placing products on the shelf and the menu.
• Recently   raised a $50M Series B led by Telus.

Alex’s Top Findings:

1. Bridge Round as Strategic Onboarding. Two external industry players joined a bridge round before the Series B—including Telus—allowing time for mutual diligence and relationship building. " So the thing with Telus was that they actually joined our bridge round before leading the round. So that allowed us to get to know one another better, see the dynamics, get to see how the businesses are performing, and build a more meaningful relationship. Sometimes you have to do the bridge just to bring your money in and to extend the runway. We actually brought two new external investors that we thought were extremely important for the future of the company, and one of them actually ended up leading the round."
2. Protect Against Overvaluation Temptation. Alon cautions founders about inflated valuations in early rounds that lead to pain down the road for teams, customers, and investors. "I know the other way to grow with your valuation, not grow into your valuation. So raising money for that will get you into trouble because the evaluation is inflated. Will necessarily mean that you're gonna be disappointing your employees, your shareholders, and maybe your future investors are gonna be happy because you recapped yourself.  The idea is to think about your business in the long term and not to get tempted. By the way, a lot of money in the early days corrupted a lot of companies 'cause you're not focused, you are trying to double and triple your team every year.”
3. Good SaaS is Good SaaS—Even in Foodtech. Despite AgriFoodTech volatility, Tastewise stands out with traditional SaaS metrics: high NDR, low churn, strong growth, and margin. “ SaaS businesses are very easy to manage if you're focusing on the essentials, which is ‘Do I really generate revenue? Is my product sticky enough? Am I able to grow my portfolio?’ And I think we happen to be a software solution in the food industry. We're an enterprise software solution. We are attending agritech and food tech conferences, but essentially we're actually like a marketing cloud for the food industry. Where we feel, we think there is a hundred billion dollars of addressable market for us,

Agros: Max Nelen shares how to get funded in 2025

Investment Climate Podcast: Fundraising Playbooks From Food Tech CEOs and VCs 

In this podcast series, Alex Shandrovsky interviews investors about benchmarks for funding Alt Proteins in 2025 and uncovers the investment playbooks of successful Climate Tech CEOs and Leading VCs.

Podcast Host Alex Shandrovksy is a strategic advisor to numerous global food tech accelerators and companies, including alternative proteins and cellular agriculture leaders. His focus is on investor relations and post-raise scale for agrifood tech companies. This podcast is syndicated through our media partners, Foodtech Weekly and Vegconomist.

Episode 39: Agros: Max Nelen shares how to get funded in 2025

In this episode, I speak with Max Nelen, founder and CEO of Agros, a Southeast Asia-based startup bringing sustainable irrigation solutions to smallholder farmers. Max shares how Agros raised a $4.25M Series A led by Wavemaker and Schneider Electric, structured around strategic alignment and customer-led investment. We unpack how the team tackled affordability with a debt stacking approach, turned hardware into a subscription model, and built trust in low-tech communities. Max also offers honest reflections on founder resilience, navigating tough markets, and staying aligned with his co-founder and spouse.

Key Facts Agros:

• Goal: To double farmers' income while making their farm climate-resilient for generations to come.
• Recently   closed Series A of $4.25M co-led by Schneider Electric Energy Access Asia and Wavemaker Impact.

Alex’s Top Findings:

1. Warm Intros Over Cold Outreach. Every investor on Agros’ cap table came through a warm introduction, prior working relationship, or event—not cold outreach. " When I look at my cap table, none of my investors were cold outreach, really, either events, personal connection, even the others were a warm intro. I think it could be from an existing investor or another network. So I guess it reminds you, as a founder, you have to build a company, but you have to be out there and reach out to people."
2. Debt Stacking to Reduce Dilution. Max leveraged non-dilutive debt in tandem with equity, aiming for long-term hardware financing efficiency while keeping investor confidence high. "  Debt is non-dilutive capital. So if you wanna raise 6 million, you can raise 6 million in equity, but then you either bump up the valuation to make it work. Then, potentially, you'll suffer later because you have to make the growth numbers work, or you raise less, get at a lower valuation, have higher upside later down the line, and get extra debt to finance also the working capital, financing, working capital, which is in climate tech and also in us a big. We decided to go up to one. So, the debt-to-equity ratio can be higher if that's your appetite, depending on your cash flows as well. 
3. Pre-Alignment With Board on Downside Scenarios. Max proactively secured alignment with his board on fallback plans before going out to raise, ensuring room to maneuver if the market froze. “ So I went to the board and said, ’Look, I'm gonna go out and raise. Do I have a safety net? Is there a backup plan? 'cause the market is cold and it's gonna be hard.’ Some people say, no, but you don't worry, you have all the things there. I say, ‘yeah, but the market is irrational. I need a guarantee of how hard I can go.’ I need, therefore, a guarantee that if it doesn't work initially, we can always do a convertible.”

ClearLeaf: Lawrence Pratt shares how to get funded in 2025

Investment Climate Podcast: Fundraising Playbooks From Food Tech CEOs and VCs 

In this podcast series, Alex Shandrovsky interviews investors about benchmarks for funding Alt Proteins in 2025 and uncovers the investment playbooks of successful Climate Tech CEOs and Leading VCs.

Podcast Host Alex Shandrovksy is a strategic advisor to numerous global food tech accelerators and companies, including alternative proteins and cellular agriculture leaders. His focus is on investor relations and post-raise scale for agrifood tech companies. This podcast is syndicated through our media partners, Foodtech Weekly and Vegconomist.

Episode 38: ClearLeaf: Lawrence Pratt shares how to get funded in 2025

In this episode, I speak with Lawrence Pratt, co-founder and president of Clear Leaf, a Costa Rica–based agtech startup developing non-toxic, broad-spectrum fungicides and bactericides. Lawrence walks us through the long and methodical journey to closing their seed round, led by Hawthorne Food Ventures, and shares why Clear Leaf focused exclusively on agtech VCs who understand the slower scaling realities of agriculture. We explore how accelerator competitions like MassChallenge and Grow-NY built investor trust, how a strategic licensing deal in Japan helped overcome objections about global traction, and why their product—effective, shelf-stable, and climate-friendly—offers a rare alternative to both synthetic chemicals and fragile biologicals.

Key Facts ClearLeaf:

• Goal: To create sustainable crop protection strategies that manage the impacts of harmful pests while maintaining natural balances on the farm, protecting farmers and consumers.
• Recently  closed a seed series round with lead investors, Hawthorne Food Ventures, a fund run by a family office out of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Alex’s Top Findings:

1. Fundraising Duration: 18 Months of Persistent Process. The fundraising round took 18 months from start to close. The team planned for 12 months but hit delays due to market cycles and fit. "  We were definitely not planning for 18 months, but we were planning for 12, and we had realistic expectations. We were at the time a kind of interesting spot. Our market product was getting decent market acceptance in a couple of different markets. Still, our experience has been this strange, squishy middle when you're very early stage and you don't have any sales people who get all excited about your technology."
2. Fundraising Methodology: Global Mapping + Relentless Follow-Up. The team built a broad investor universe across the US and Europe, tracked progress in spreadsheets, and stayed in touch even with non-deploying funds. " We got a lot of advice and a lot of input, and we were able to fine-tune how we were approaching some of these funds. It was just basically a lot of Excel spreadsheets, tracking who we had talked to and when we last spoke to them. Is it time to go back to them again? A year ago, they said they were bringing in a new $50 million group of LPs as a time to go back to them, and we just kept coming back. Everybody who didn't slam the door in our face would rather say, ‘Hey, you're interesting. Let's talk more when we're in a better position. We just kept following up and following up."
3. Lead Investor Origin: Warmed-Up Cold Intro via Biz Dev. Hawthorne Food Ventures initially met Clear Leaf at World AgriTech in 2023. A London-based BD partner rekindled the connection via a referral from another fund. “ That was in 2023. We then re-met them in a more meaningful way, through a strategic connection that was brought to us by our business development arm, which is based in London. We work with a group in London on a variety of different issues, including biz dev, and we triangulated back onto Hawthorne Food Ventures. Then, we got i

Bovotica: Andrew Leech shares how to get funded in 2025

Investment Climate Podcast: Fundraising Playbooks From Food Tech CEOs and VCs 

In this podcast series, Alex Shandrovsky interviews investors about benchmarks for funding Alt Proteins in 2025 and uncovers the investment playbooks of successful Climate Tech CEOs and Leading VCs.

Podcast Host Alex Shandrovksy is a strategic advisor to numerous global food tech accelerators and companies, including alternative proteins and cellular agriculture leaders. His focus is on investor relations and post-raise scale for agrifood tech companies. This podcast is syndicated through our media partners, Foodtech Weekly and Vegconomist.

Episode 37: Bovotica: Andrew Leech shares how to get funded in 2025

In this episode, I talk with Andrew Leech, co-founder and CEO of Bovotica, an Australian startup developing probiotic and prebiotic technologies that reduce methane and improve cattle productivity. Andrew walks us through the journey of closing a $3.4M seed round—highlighting the power of warm intros, the realities of raising over 14 months, and the personal sacrifices it took (including selling his house). We dive into valuation strategy using PitchBook, structuring university spinouts, equity-based advisory deals, and how team credibility can overcome early-stage scientific risk. It’s a raw, insightful look at what it truly takes to fund and lead a deep-tech ag startup.

Key Facts Bovotica:

• Goal: To reduce methane emissions from cattle while simultaneously delivering production efficiency.
• Recently closed a $3.4 million seed round led by AgriZeroNZ.

Alex’s Top Findings:

1. Founder Sacrifices: Sold His House to Stay Afloat. Andrew quit his day job and funded himself through savings — ultimately selling his home to commit full-time and keep the company alive. " I made the decision to quit my day job and go in this full-time. You have to have at least one person in the company going full time. If you're trying to raise a seed round and hold down even a part-time job, it gets very tricky. It got tough towards the end for me. I had to sell and ended up selling my house to keep myself going while we raised the seed round. But look, in the end, that was a risk that was really worth taking for me."
2. IP Deal with University: Exclusive License, Then Assignment. Bovotica initially licensed the IP from QUT with a clause for assignment post-raise — creating a win-win for both university and investors. " I think one of the reasons our seed round took a bit longer is there was a bit of back and forth between Bovotica and QUT to make sure we had the right structure to get that investment. We've got a really good relationship with QUT and our process was we wanted to license the IP initially and then once we'd completed the seed round, get the university to assign that IP into the company. So that de-risked it for the university that if we can't raise the money, then it's only an exclusive license. But it also gives something to the investor as well that if we close the seed round, the IP is assigned to Bovotica, and Bovotica actually physically owns all the IP that it needs to put the deal forward. So obviously in these sorts of situations. The university is looking to get a fair deal or what it believes the IP is worth."
3. $9.4M Post-Money Valuation Grounded in PitchBook Comps. Bovotica used PitchBook data to benchmark valuations of comparable methane-reduction startups globally, arriving at a $6M pre-money valuation. “I was lucky enough to have access to a PitchBook subscription, so I did I pulled hundreds of reports out a PitchBook.The first thing the investors ask you, once they're interested is, okay, what's the premoney you pull this number out and if you've got data behind you from PitchBook to back that up, it makes the conversations go so mu

CropMind: Damilare Odumosu and Rillwan Shokunbi share how to get funded in 2025

Investment Climate Podcast: Fundraising Playbooks From Food Tech CEOs and VCs 

In this podcast series, Alex Shandrovsky interviews investors about benchmarks for funding Alt Proteins in 2025 and uncovers the investment playbooks of successful Climate Tech CEOs and Leading VCs.

Podcast Host Alex Shandrovksy is a strategic advisor to numerous global food tech accelerators and companies, including alternative proteins and cellular agriculture leaders. His focus is on investor relations and post-raise scale for agrifood tech companies. This podcast is syndicated through our media partners, Foodtech Weekly and Vegconomist.

Episode 36: CropMind: Damilare and Rillwan share how to get funded in 2025

In this episode, I speak with Damilare and Rillwan, co-founders of CopMind, a startup using computer vision to help permanent crop growers—like apple and grape farmers—accurately estimate yield. Based in New Brunswick, Canada, the team raised $500K from the New Brunswick Innovation Foundation and BKL Capital. They share how they built the company from a master’s thesis, cold-called dozens of farmers, and co-developed the product directly with end users. We explore their grassroots fundraising strategy, association-driven go-to-market playbook, and why their “farmer-first” approach—rooted in empathy, technical precision, and local ecosystem partnerships—is what sets them apart in agtech.

Key Facts CropMind:

• Goal: To enable tree fruit farmers (e.g. apples, grapes) to better estimate yields using computer vision, improving supply forecasting and operational planning.
• Recently raised $500K from the New Brunswick Innovation Foundation and BKL Capital.

Alex’s Top Findings:

1. Cold Outreach with High Empathy and Research. They contacted farmers through cold emails, calls, and in-person visits — always customized based on real research and communicated with humility. " We could lay our hands on email, quote, calling, and going to the orchard. First, do your research about that particular firm. Even though it's a cold email, try to say one or two things you know about their farm."
2. Academic Origins: From Master’s Project to Real Business. The venture started as a master’s thesis in Technology Management at the University of New Brunswick and evolved into a commercial product. " So we did a technology management program at UMB. Our research was focused on agriculture, a tech innovation. We initially started working on this from the university, and we've done a bit of extensive research at that point. We've even built something for testing. So after university, we have now started to think of how to make it much more real, and we had to quit our jobs, start working on this."
3. Valuation Grounded in Traction. While it was a SAFE/pre-seed round (not priced), they supported valuation with early product-market fit, LoIs, and real usage metrics. “ We had to do some estimates based on certain activities within the organization. For instance, we have a product that was raised.  Also, in terms of the value of the product market potential, that has to be factored in when investors want to estimate and say you should like this because of this market potential barrier to entry in the industry. So these are like more qualitative and some quantitative information that we used to support the estimates.”