The Ireland Strategic Investment Fund (ISIF) has invested €40m in the agri sector, which should boost Ireland’s potential to become a global ag tech hub.

Twenty million euro is being used to set up the Ireland Ag Tech fund, a new fund that will be managed directly by Finistere Ventures, a California-based venture capital firm.

Speaking to Cathal Fitzgerald, head of food and agriculture investments, and Kieran Furlong, Finistere, before the launch, the Irish Farmers Journal was told that the aim is to invest in start-ups and early stage companies that have game-changing technologies for farmers and the industry.

The second €20m is being invested by ISIF in the global ag tech Finistere Ventures II fund that has over €100m under management.

“This is the launch of a strategy that we first started working on in 2014,” said Cathal.

“We were approached to invest in the ag tech sector and identified the potential and the need. The ISIF remit is to invest on a commercial basis to support economic activity and employment in Ireland. Agriculture and now ag tech has been identified as an engine of growth,” added Cathal.

ISIF has invested €140m into the agriculture sector. The most prominent for farmers is their involvement with Glanbia and Rabobank in launching the innovative Milkflex fund.

“It has proven successful and we hope to follow on with other co-ops,” said Cathal.

Launching the ag tech initiative to industry stakeholders, Minister for Agriculture Michael Creed said the investment by ISIF complements Government strategy set out in Food Wise 2025 and many years of investment in agricultural research and innovation in Ireland.”

Why Finistere Ventures?

“We work with our stakeholders and strategic financial partners to deliver leading edge solutions for the agri food sector. We sought out a best-in-class ag tech fund such as Finistere, which has a global reputation in what is still a very specialised area of venture investing and its decision to locate its first EU office in Dublin is a significant vote of confidence in Ireland’s agri food credentials,” Cathal told me.

The initiative sees Kieran Furlong, a native of Wexford, return home after many years to set up Finistere’s first EU office.

Successful

“The first fund Finistere set up was in 2005 when ag tech was at its infancy,” he said. Its team has developed and invested in some of the most successful ag tech companies of the last 20 years. They work closely with industry leaders such as Agrium, Bayer, DuPont, the International Farming Corporation and PepsiCo, giving them deep insights into the sector.

“In our view, Ireland is a hot spot for ag tech. All the ingredients are here – a longstanding, export-oriented agri food industry, world-leading research at Irish universities and institutions such as Teagasc, and, of course, the thriving IT, biopharma and medtech sectors,” said Kieran.

“We want Ireland to be the ag tech island – a hub for European ag tech,” he added.

As with any VC fund, success will be measured in the return to investors.

“We have already identified some companies that have the potential to scale internationally. We are looking for companies that have established a proof of concept and are looking to raise over €1m to really start to build to scale their technologies,” Kieran added.