The Global Startup Ecosystem Report (GSER): Agtech & New Food Edition launched today from Startup Genome, in partnership with the Global Entrepreneurship Network. The GSER is the world’s most comprehensive, data-driven research on startups with 280+ entrepreneurial innovation ecosystems and 3 million startups analyzed. Agricultural technology, as a sub-sector, captures the use of technology in agriculture, horticulture, and aquaculture aimed at improving yield, efficiency, and profitability through information monitoring and analysis of weather, pests, soil, and air temperature. New Food employs innovation to optimize food design, creation, diversity, distribution, and utilization.

The Agtech & New Food Edition explores technology-based startups with a focus on improving agricultural efficiency and sustainability – including drones, alternative proteins, vertical farming, waste management, and more, along with a ranking of the top Agtech & New Food ecosystems globally. Key highlights from the Agtech & New Food Edition include:

• The top five Agtech & New Food ecosystems are Silicon Valley, New York City, London, Tel Aviv-Jerusalem, and Denver-Boulder.

• North America and Asia dominate the top 25 Agtech & New Food ranking, with 48% and 20% respectively. Europe has four ecosystems in the top 25, Oceania has two, and MENA one.

• The amount of Series B+ deals in Agtech & New Food worldwide rose from $3.8 million in 2017 to $11.5 million in 2021. North America accounted for 70% of Series B+ deals in 2021.

• Due to shifts in consumer behavior and rapid innovation in the sub-sector (including pandemic-driven changes), the share of food and grocery delivery deals has climbed steadily in recent years. In 2021, delivery accounted for 11% of the $1.6 billion invested in Agtech & New Food, up from just 2% of total dollar amount invested in the sub-sector in 2017 and 6% in 2020.

• Startups that create vegan products (both food and other items) and non-cultivated meat alternatives overtook cultivated meat in terms of deal amount at the seed stage in 2021, suggesting increasing early-stage innovation in the meat alternative field. 

“Agtech & New Food is one of the most attractive sub-sectors given its strong growth and it offering much needed global solutions to food disparity as well as environmental and employment sustainability,” shares JF Gauthier, Founder & CEO of Startup Genome.

Within the report, Agtech & New Food ecosystems are ranked based on many weighted factors including: economic performance, concentration of startups, sub-sector strengths, engineering talent, and level and growth of early-stage funding. The report includes contributed articles from Agtech & New Food experts such as Caroline Bushnell of The Good Food Institute and Amy Wu of From Farms to Incubators. The data powering the report is contributed from several sources including: Dealroom, Crunchbase, PitchBook, CB Insights, local partners, and Startup Genome’s proprietary data, which includes interviews with 100+ experts and 10,000+ survey participants annually.