Participated · Equity · Jan 2023

Cropin describes itself as the world’s largest deployed AI platform for food and agriculture, offering an AI-powered decision-support system for farmers and agribusinesses. Its core product, FIRST Potato, integrates crop-specific intelligence, real-time field data from sensors, satellite imagery, weather stations, IoT devices, Cropin’s proprietary data models, and predictive analytics to deliver plot-specific daily advisories. The platform helps farmers optimize irrigation, input usage, and residue management to adopt regenerative practices without compromising yield or quality, improving soil health and reducing environmental footprint. Cropin has secured a €700,000 AI deal under EIT Food’s Impact Funding Framework to scale the FIRST Potato deployment across Europe. Planned activities include scientific validation on pilot farms in Denmark and commercial pilots with two potato processors in Germany and the UK, in partnership with Aarhus University. The company is actively engaging in strategic commercial partnerships and is in advanced discussions with several UK and European agri-food brands, expecting to close multiple pilots before the end of the current financial year. Cropin offers an intelligent agriculture cloud platform (Cropin Cloud) and a suite of AI, machine-learning and remote-sensing SaaS solutions that help agribusinesses digitize operations from farm to fork. The company provides actionable, near–real-time farm data and predictive intelligence across crop types and geographies. Cropin reports partnerships with 250+ organizations, has digitized over 16 million acres, reached nearly 7 million farmers, and built intelligence for 400+ crops and 10,000+ crop varieties in 56 countries. Founded in 2010 and headquartered in Bangalore, Cropin focuses on making farms and harvests traceable, predictable, and sustainable. The company plans to expand Cropin Cloud’s capabilities, invest in go-to-market efforts, and develop next-generation predictive intelligence through Cropin AI Labs. Cropin says the new funding will support regional and industry expansion and solutions that address sustainable agriculture and global food security. CropIn offers SaaS and data solutions—notably SmartFarm (farm and agronomy management) and SmartRisk (machine-learning predictive analytics)—that help agri-enterprises improve efficiency, traceability, productivity, and sustainability across crop value chains. SmartRisk combines computer vision, deep learning, multispectral imagery, field scouting data, and hyperlocal weather to analyze over 388 crops and nearly 9,500 variants across trillions of data points. The company reports SmartRisk has processed more than 160 million hectares, has impacted 13 million acres and 4 million farmers to date, and could potentially reach 70 million farmers in the next 3–5 years. Smallholder farmers served by CropIn’s platforms have seen crop-yield increases of nearly 25% in the first year after adopting recommended practices. CropIn is investing the new capital to deepen AI capabilities, continue innovating SmartRisk, and expand globally—recently opening an Amsterdam office and hiring local leaders to drive growth in Europe. With partnerships spanning development finance institutions and government entities in 52 countries, CropIn focuses on digitization, predictability, traceability, financial inclusion, climate-smart agriculture, and sustainability. CropIn provides SmartFarm, a ground-to-cloud technology platform for plot-level farm management that is deployed through agribusinesses' field agents to enable B2B2F operations. The company also develops a machine-learning-based risk product called SmartRisk. It currently monitors about 3 million acres across 2 million farmers and serves 180+ customers, including large agribusinesses, banks, government bodies and development agencies, across 29 countries. CropIn plans to scale its platform in India and globally to monitor more than 10 million actively monitored acres across 7 million farmers. The company is co-founded by Krishna Kumar, Kunal Prasad and Chittaranjan Jena and is based in Bengaluru. Financially, the startup has raised a total of $12M to date. CropIn Technology Solutions is a Bengaluru-based agri-tech startup founded in 2010 by Krishna Kumar that provides a cloud-based software platform to help farmers track produce and consignments. Its offering includes enterprise resource planning and business intelligence with a built-in traceability system and tools to manage the field workforce. The platform collaborates with participants across the supply chain to monitor the status of farm produce. CropIn plans to invest the recent funding in technology, data science and predictive technologies to detect and predict crops in different regions. The company has raised about $4 million to date; the current pre-Series A amount was undisclosed. In August 2016 it raised $2 million from Denmark’s Sophia Investment ApS in a transaction that valued the company at $12 million.

Participated · Series D · Jul 2021

Vedanta's lead program, VE303, is an orally administered live biotherapeutic product comprising a defined consortium of eight bacterial strains, developed to prevent recurrent Clostridioides difficile infection. VE303 is produced from pure, clonal bacterial cell banks to yield a standardized powdered drug product and has received FDA Orphan Drug designation (2017) and Fast Track designation (2023). The registrational Phase 3 RESTORATiVE303 trial is randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled with a 2:1 randomization and a primary endpoint of CDI recurrence rate at Week 8. RESTORATiVE303 is enrolling across more than 150 sites in about 20 countries, has passed a DMC interim analysis recommending continuation, and is expected to complete enrollment in H2 2026 with topline data in H1 2027. Vedanta is funding the trial through the recent $60M financing package and supplemental BARDA funding. The company intends the RESTORATiVE303 study to form the basis for a Biologics License Application to the U.S. FDA.

Participated · Series B · Mar 2021

Iridia, headquartered in Carlsbad, CA, is developing integrated DNA-based data storage that combines proprietary enzymology and semiconductor technology to write, store, and read information in synthetic DNA. Its core approach uses enzyme-based chemistry and programmable semiconductor systems to add DNA-based bits, aiming for orders-of-magnitude higher density and durability than conventional archival technologies. The company positions its solution as more energy-efficient, cost-competitive, and secure, with a much smaller physical and carbon footprint than current data-center storage. Iridia is working toward commercially viable, decodable DNA storage by developing working prototypes that can manipulate single DNA molecules and read them back using the same device. Current plans funded by new financing include further validation of the technology, prototype development, and doubling headcount and physical footprint to accelerate growth. Iridia develops an integrated DNA-based memory chip that combines semiconductor technology with proprietary enzyme-based chemistry to write, store, and read digital data using synthetic DNA as the storage medium. The company’s chip-level approach aims to increase data density and durability while dramatically reducing the physical and carbon footprints of commercial data centers. Iridia says its technology can encode and read DNA on-chip, eliminating the need for complex storage infrastructure and laboratory sequencing. Management projects a dramatic cost reduction in encoding and retrieving 1 TB of DNA-stored data from more than $1 million today to less than $1. The recent financing is intended to accelerate development of the world’s first commercially viable DNA memory chips and to demonstrate scalability. Iridia is headquartered in Carlsbad, California.

Participated · Equity · Dec 2020

Cambridge Quantum Computing (CQC) develops quantum computing software and applications, notably its enterprise platform EUMEN and the t|ket> quantum software development toolkit. The company launched enterprise-level products in 2020 targeting cybersecurity and quantum chemistry and reports a growing roster of Fortune Global 500 customers and partners across the USA, Europe and Asia. CQC completed a $45 million financing to accelerate commercialization and consolidate its leadership position in quantum software and applications. Investors in the round include Honeywell Ventures, IBM Ventures, JSR Corporation, Serendipity Capital, Alvarium Investments and Talipot Holdings. Management says the funding will enable advancement of its ambitious plans as hardware scales and enterprise customers recognize quantum impact. The company emphasizes a product-first focus and commercial momentum across cybersecurity, quantum chemistry and materials discovery.

Led · Equity · Aug 2020

Mattrix Technologies develops a proprietary OLET (organic light emitting transistor) pixel architecture that combines drive transistor, storage capacitor and light-emitting layers into a single element to enable full-aperture, bottom-emission OLED panels. Its technology aims to allow panel manufacturers to repurpose aging LCD fabs to produce higher-margin OLED products while avoiding hundreds of millions of dollars in new capital expenditure. The pixel architecture reportedly improves OLED power efficiency by more than 10%, doubles product lifetime, and yields a larger emissive aperture for brighter displays suitable for automotive and interactive signage. Mattrix is collaborating with materials partners (notably JSR) to develop solution-based conductive inks for a new class of backplane transistor as part of commercialization efforts. Financially, the company has opened a $3M financing round and received a $1.5M follow-on investment from JSR; it is seeking the remaining $1.25M to close the round. Founded in 2018 and based in Gainesville, Florida, Mattrix is pursuing investor partnerships, licensing and commercialization opportunities. Mattrix Technologies is a semiconductor device company developing breakthrough pixel architectures for flat-panel displays, centered on its CN-VOLET organic light emitting transistor (OLET) technology. The company has developed the world’s first full-aperture OLET display and positions OLET as a new emissive display paradigm to circumvent OLED backplane limitations. CN-VOLET combines the drive transistor, storage capacitor, and light-emitting layers into a sequentially deposited, vertical, transparent stack to enable high aperture ratio, bottom emission, simplified manufacturing, improved lifetime, and lower power consumption. Mattrix holds licensed IP including 16 U.S. patents with more than 350 claims and international filings, and is seeking collaborative partners to license the technology for commercialization. The company plans to use recent funding to develop production-ready manufacturing processes and fabricate a fully integrated display prototype. Mattrix is a resident client of the University of Florida’s UF Innovate | The Hub and recently added industry veteran Bruce Berkoff to its board.