🌊 200% increase in blue economy investments
PLUS: India and Japan join forces to support seaweed cultivation, and KAS raises $3 million.
“You can’t force this on farmers, you have to meet them where they are.” — Chris Adamo, VP of public affairs & regenerative ag policy at Danone North America
Dear seaweed and microalgae investors, buyers, operators, and technologists, welcome to another edition of the Paxtier Report!
Food for thought…
Last week, I spent some time flicking through the EU’s new BlueInvest Investor Report, which offered some valuable insights.
The report provides a comprehensive overview of the EU’s blue economy investment landscape, encompassing 2,904 deals made by 2,142 investors between January 2000 and February 2023. It also sheds light on investor perspectives and opportunity areas, with seaweed and microalgae featuring within the context of aquaculture and blue biotechnology.
If I had to distil the report into a few key takeaways…
Firstly, it highlights an encouraging 200% increase in investments in the blue economy between 2018 and 2022, a sign of growing interest and momentum…
… Secondly, when it comes to challenges, the report reveals new data that substantiates some widely acknowledged issues in the sector:
There’s a massive global unmet financing gap (see below),
Investments are concentrating too much at market launch phase (seed), and
Investors are being put off by:
A need for too much upfront investment,
A lack of investment-grade projects, and
The (investor’s own) lack of expertise or knowledge.
If you happen to go through the report, I’d be keen to hear your take on it. Let me know in the comments section below.
Have a great day.
— Peter
In today’s report…
Markets: 📈 India and Japan join forces to support seaweed cultivation in Tamil Nadu.
Deals: 🤝 KAS, the algal astaxanthin startup, raises $3 million.
Movers and Shakers: 🌊 Veramaris has received authorisation for the use of algal oil in salmonid aquafeeds in Canada.
Around the web: 💡 Climate-friendly beef? Argentina’s new ‘carbon-neutral’ certification could help reduce livestock emissions – if it’s done right.
Markets and Investing
✂️Algae Market Snippets
Some big moves in recent weeks…
Seaweed
🌊 Simply Blue Group has joined the North Sea Farm 1 (NSF1) project consortium to develop the world’s first commercial-scale seaweed farm located within an offshore wind farm (Read more HERE)
🤝 India and Japan join forces to support seaweed cultivation in Tamil Nadu (Read more HERE)
🤝 SHORE seaweed chips have officially landed in Tesco stores (Read more HERE)
📈 Maine's commercial fisheries landings significantly increased in 2023 (Read more HERE).
🎥 Doc Martin actor Martin Clunes calls out seaweed farming licence in Cornwall, UK (Read more HERE).
💸 More than 1000 investors have backed Fremantle Seaweed via a Birchal equity crowdfunding campaign, which saw the Western Australian company raise $1.26 million this week (Read more HERE)
🌿 Philippines: The Department of Science and Technology (DOST) distributed 1,360 litres of Carrageenan Plant Growth Promoter (CPGP) in Lanao del Norte for rice farmers affected by recent weather events (Read more HERE).
🎉 Pacific Harvest achieves B Corp Certification, pioneering ethical seaweed industry in New Zealand (Read more HERE).
🌿 Thalasso BioTech's container-based sargassum micro biorefinery starts construction (Read more HERE).
🔬 In an effort to bolster Scotland’s biotechnology sector, the Scottish government unveils a £847,000 investment (Read more HERE).
🇲🇾 According to Sabah Media, Sabah in Malaysia registered approximately 225,048 metric tonnes of seaweed production in 2023 (Read more HERE).
🌿 The Port Administration of the Autonomous Region of Madeira (APRAM) has been cleaning up an invasion of sargassum on the island of Porto Santo (Read more HERE).
💸 Ministers from Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland have announced a €9 million funding initiative supporting bioeconomy innovation and solutions (Read more HERE).
🎉 Through a new partnership with Earth Brands, Notpla's seaweed-coated boxes are now available in the United States (Read more HERE).
🌊 The state-owned Zanzibar Seaweed Company (ZASCO) over the weekend signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Tanzania’s NMB Bank (Read more HERE).
Microalgae
💸 KAS, the algal astaxanthin startup, raises $3 million (Read more HERE).
🎉 NewFish enters IndieBio Batch 15 with SOSV funding, establishing HQ in San Francisco (Read more HERE).
🎉 In an unprecedented move, Veramaris has received authorisation for the use of algal oil in salmonid aquafeeds in Canada, following a three-year long registration process (Read more HERE).
🎉 Algine Plus has announced its launch on One Lavi (Read more HERE).
💸 Space Agency giving NI funding to monitor harmful algae blooms from above (Read more HERE).
💸 Phycobloom has been selected as a participant in the Engineering Biology CR&D competition run by Innovate UK (Read more HERE).
🎉 Aker BioMarine launches algae DHA ingredient called FloraMarine (Read more HERE).
🎉Bioriginal and POS launch sustainable omega-3 line (Read more HERE).
🐦Tweets of the week
🔥 What else was hot in seaweed and microalgae this week?
General
📍It’s an election year for the Westminster parliament, so what is the aquaculture industry looking for from the politicians? Sandy Neil investigates (Read more HERE).
🌍 Climate-friendly beef? Argentina’s new ‘carbon-neutral’ certification could help reduce livestock emissions – if it’s done right (Read more HERE)
Seaweed
☕ Keurig develops plastic-free coffee pod (Read more HERE).
🌿 Rootless takes on menopause stigma (Read more HERE).
🌍 Danone VP on methane reduction in dairy: ‘You can’t force this on farmers, you have to meet them where they are’ (Read more HERE).
🧪 (Paper) Conventional extraction of fucoidan from Irish brown seaweed Fucus vesiculosus followed by ultrasound-assisted depolymerization (Read more HERE).
💲 So What’s in My Kelp Anyways? A deeper dive into kelp composition by Macro Oceans (Read more HERE).
Microalgae
💡 Innovo, which grows algae in bioreactors fed by fossil fuel emissions, believes that buy-in from the aquafeed sector can help them scale up their concept (Read more HERE).
🧪 (Paper) Photosynthetically-powered phototactic active nematic liquid crystal fluids and gels (Read more HERE).
🟢 HyveGeo, founded in 2023 by Abdulaziz bin Redha, Dr Samsurin Welch (COO), Eva Morales (chief strategy officer), and Dr Harjit Singh (chief engineer), is developing microalgae technology for carbon removal and soil regeneration (Read more HERE).
That’s all folks!
Thanks again for joining us this week. If you think we’ve missed something worth highlighting from the past few weeks - drop us a line below or via LinkedIn. Hope you have a great day and stay tuned for more seaweed and microalgae updates soon!
Best,
Peter