Insect farming startup Ÿnsect announced today that they have extended their Series C funding to $372 million – the largest amount ever raised by a non-American ”agtech” business.
The new capital will fund completion of the largest insect farm in the world, due to open in the city of Amiens, France in early 2022.
Ÿnsect will produce 100.000 tons of insect products annually, as well as create 500 direct and indirect jobs. It will also let the company expand beyond Europe and Asia into the United States, with the support of its first U.S.-based investors, Upfront Ventures and FootPrint Coalition; and grow its markets into the supply of wet pet food.
Ÿnsect has created a patented process for cultivating mealworm to produce a variety of highly digestible protein and fertilizer products.
These products sustainably replace animal proteins consumed in the supply chain by fish & livestock farms, animal proteins used in pet food and fertilizers used in plant nutrition, while leading to greater yields and health benefits for the animals and plants being fed.
By cultivating mealworms in a vertical farm, Ÿnsect uses 98% less land while significantly reducing the carbon & biodiversity footprints of protein production.
