Opportunity for

• Researchers, inventors, entrepreneurs, institutions, corporations, or any other owners of agritech IP, that want venture studio support to find product market fit and drive commercialisation.

Industry challenge:

Carrot Ventures commercialises novel agricultural technology by forming and funding new companies. We seek agricultural technologies that solve significant market challenges across the ag and food value chain. For each opportunity, we form a new company and recruit an experienced business professional to bring the innovation to market. We then lead the first round of investment in the new company. Technologies must have some relevance to Canadian agriculture, and we form our companies in Canada, but we have flexibility on where our CEOs reside, and on the initial market to enter.

Many great technologies do not achieve commercial success. We have taken our deep experience in direct early-stage investing and identified many consistent challenges that startups face. We built a model that addresses each of these challenges to improve the likelihood of success and speed to market. We start with a venture-scale technology that has reached proof-of-concept stage, and then create a company that includes the following elements:

• Clear and compelling value proposition
• Experienced leadership with a track record of success
• Clean corporate and capital structures
• Robust financial controls and governance
• Sufficient capital investment at the seed stage to facilitate commercialisation.

The outcome is a company that is well prepared for the journey ahead, thereby increasing the likelihood that the innovation achieves its commercial and financial potential.

Current opportunity:

We are actively seeking technologies that have a significant value proposition and do not currently have a path to market. We aim to form and fund several new AgTech companies in the coming years. Carrot Ventures Fund I is a CAD$15M Fund, aiming to form 4-6 new companies.

We have successfully formed two companies to date:

• Susterre Technologies – An agricultural equipment technology utilising ultra-high-pressure water jets in zero till seeding applications. This has many agronomic and environmental benefits and will allow greater adoption of regenerative practices like cover cropping and zero till cropping.

• Cellar Insights – Smart remote monitoring and analysis of storage conditions for root crops such as potatoes. Allows growers to remotely track conditions in their facilities and take action to prevent excessive shrink or rot.

Opportunity background

For Carrot Ventures, our value proposition is our venture-building playbook. Our team combines venture capital experience with hands-on operational and entrepreneurship skills. We identify novel technology with venture scale growth opportunities, search for and enable a leader specific to each opportunity, and provide governance and support for newly formed companies to be successful. Our companies raise significant seed rounds that give them the runway to be successful. We work with investment and commercialization partners to amplify value within the community.

Opportunity other applications:

We have identified opportunities to work with innovators who are commercialising technologies for other industries, by building a company to commercialize their technology for the agricultural markets. For example, a startup may be developing a device for human health applications, and we could start a new company to commercialise the technology for agricultural applications. In that example, they would continue to develop the human health market opportunity, while the CarrotCo. concurrently builds value in the agricultural market.