REG - Agronomics Limited - Investee Company Update: Tropic Biosciences

AgronomicsAnnouncement

08/07/2022 12:30

For best results when printing this announcement, please click on link below:
http://newsfile.refinitiv.com/getnewsfile/v1/story?guid=urn:newsml:reuters.com:20220708:nRSH8804Ra&default-theme=true

RNS Number : 8804R  Agronomics Limited  08 July 2022

8 July 2022

 

Agronomics Limited

("Agronomics" or the "Company")

Investee Company Update: Tropic Biosciences UK Limited Raise US$ 35 Million

Agronomics Limited (AIM:ANIC), a leading listed company focused on cellular
agriculture, is pleased to announce that portfolio company, Tropic Biosciences
UK Limited ("Tropic Biosciences"), has successfully raised US$ 35 million in
its latest funding round led by sustainable food system investor, Blue
Horizon. Other investors participating in the Convertible Loan Note include
DisruptAD, Bloom8 (formerly Rage Capital), Skyviews Life Science, Sucden
Ventures and Tekfen Ventures. Agronomics first invested in March 2020 and the
position will remain carried on the books at cost, being US$
2,999,996.60.

Tropic Biosciences is a UK based gene-editing company developing
high-performing commercial varieties of tropical crops promoting cultivation
efficiencies, enhancing consumer health, and improving sustainable
environmental practices. This is made possible through the use of its
proprietary Gene Editing Induced Gene Silencing ("GEiGS") technology - which
allows minimal edits to specific non-coding genes of a host organism,
resulting in improvements such as in crop performance and crop protection. In
November 2021, they received confirmation from the United States Department of
Agriculture Animal & Plant Inspection Service ("USDA-APHIS") that its
gene-edited potato product developed using GEiGS was exempt from regulation.
This is a promising indicator that other products developed using this
technology will also not face regulatory barriers to enter the US market.

Tropic Biosciences focuses on banana, coffee and rice crops - commanding a
vast combined market of US$ 400 billion. Notably, they are developing
commercial varieties of banana that are resistant to the Panama Disease (TR4)
fungus. Panama Disease spreads rapidly and nearly all varieties of bananas,
including the main commercial variety Cavendish, are susceptible. It is
considered to be one of the greatest threats to banana production worldwide,
and as of yet there remains no cure.

This latest round of funding will allow Tropic Biosciences to accelerate and
expand its go-to-market plans.

For further information please contact:

 

 Agronomics           Beaumont              Cenkos                Peterhouse Capital    TB Cardew

 Limited              Cornish Limited       Securities Plc        Limited

 The Company          Nomad                 Joint Broker          Joint Broker          Public Relations

 Richard Reed /       Roland Cornish /      Giles Balleny /       Lucy Williams /       Ed Orlebar /

 Denham Eke           James Biddle          Michael Johnson       Charles Goodfellow    Charlotte Anderson

 +44 (0) 1624 639396  +44 (0) 207 628 3396  +44 (0) 207 397 8900  +44 (0) 207 469 0936  +44 (0) 20 7930 0777

 info@agronomics.im                                                                     +44 (0) 7738 724 630

                                                                                        agronomics@tbcardew.com

 

About Tropic Biosciences

Tropic Biosciences is one of the leading agricultural gene-editing companies
globally, and focuses on the development and commercialization of
high-performing varieties of tropical crops, namely coffee, bananas and rice.
It employs over 120 industry-leading professionals and is headquartered at the
renowned Norwich Research Park.

About Agronomics

Agronomics is a leading listed alternative proteins company with a focus on
cellular agriculture and cultivated meat. The Company has established a
portfolio of 22 companies at the Pre-Seed to Series C stage in this rapidly
advancing sector. It seeks to secure minority stakes in companies owning
technologies with defensible intellectual property that offer new ways of
producing food and materials with a focus on products historically derived
from animals. These technologies are driving a major disruption in
agriculture, offering solutions to improve sustainability, as well as
addressing human health, animal welfare and environmental damage. This
disruption will decouple supply chains from the environment and animals, as
well as being fundamental to feeding the world's expanding population. A full
list of Agronomics' portfolio companies is available at https://agronomics.im/
(https://agronomics.im/) .

About Cellular Agriculture

Cellular Agriculture is the production of agriculture products directly from
cells, as opposed to raising an animal for slaughter, or growing crops. This
encompasses cell culture to produce cultivated meat and materials, and
fermentation processes that harness a combination of molecular biology,
synthetic biology, tissue engineering and biotechnology to massively simplify
production methods in a sustainable manner.

Over the coming decades, the source of the world's food supply traditionally
derived from conventional agriculture is going to change dramatically. We have
already witnessed the first wave of this shift with the consumer adoption of
plant-based alternative proteins but today, we are on the cusp of an even
bigger wave of change. This is being facilitated by advances in cellular
agriculture. This change is necessary, given scientists claims that if we
maintain existing animal protein consumption patterns, then we will not meet
the Paris Agreement's goal of limiting warming to 1.5℃

AT Kearney, a global consultancy firm, projects that cultivated meat's market
share will reach 35% by 2040. This combined with the Good Food Institute's
estimate that a US $1.8 trillion investment will be required in order to
produce just 10% of the world's protein using this technology, means that we
are on the cusp of a multi-decade flow of capital to build out manufacturing
facilities. Funding in the field of cellular agriculture is accelerating,
however still less than US$ 4 billion has been invested worldwide since the
industry's inception in 2016.

 

This information is provided by RNS, the news service of the London Stock Exchange. RNS is approved by the Financial Conduct Authority to act as a Primary Information Provider in the United Kingdom. Terms and conditions relating to the use and distribution of this information may apply. For further information, please contact
rns@lseg.com (mailto:rns@lseg.com)
 or visit
www.rns.com (http://www.rns.com/)
.

RNS may use your IP address to confirm compliance with the terms and conditions, to analyse how you engage with the information contained in this communication, and to share such analysis on an anonymised basis with others as part of our commercial services. For further information about how RNS and the London Stock Exchange use the personal data you provide us, please see our
Privacy Policy (https://www.lseg.com/privacy-and-cookie-policy)
.   END  MSCUWUARUWUBRAR