OlsAro Raises €5M to Ready Climate-Resilient Wheat

The big picture: Swedish AgTech startup OlsAro has raised €5 million in seed funding to commercialize its salt-tolerant wheat and expand its AI-driven crop breeding platform. The round was led by Industrifonden, with Nordic Foodtech VC as co-lead. Existing investors Future Food Fund, AgFunder, GU Ventures, and PINC also participated. OlsAro, a spinout from Lund University and the University of Gothenburg, puts its total funding at about €7.5 million. The company aims to ready its first wheat product for market and open new programs for drought tolerance and nitrogen-use efficiency. OlsAro has described salt-tolerant wheat as its first product since at least April 2024.

Why it matters:

• Global Food Security: Salt-affected soils cover over 10% of the world’s land, impacting crop yields and threatening food security. OlsAro’s technology addresses this challenge by developing crops that can thrive in harsh conditions.
• Climate Resilience: Beyond salinity, the funding will enable OlsAro to tackle drought tolerance and nitrogen-use efficiency, crucial traits for adapting agriculture to climate change and reducing environmental impact.
• Scalable Impact: By partnering with seed companies and licensing its germplasm, OlsAro aims to integrate climate-resilient traits into existing high-performing breeding lines, accelerating adoption by farmers globally.

How it works:

• SeedAX Platform: OlsAro’s SeedAX platform combines genetics, data, AI-driven trait discovery, and genetic technologies to identify and validate climate-resilience traits in cereals.
• Integrated Breeding: The platform integrates these validated traits into elite germplasm, which are high-performing breeding lines already used by seed companies, streamlining the path to commercial seed programs.
• Licensing Model: OlsAro operates a licensing model, allowing partners like Lal Teer Seed in Bangladesh to handle seed multiplication, logistics, marketing, and sales, enabling rapid market penetration without building extensive in-house operations.

The catch: OlsAro’s €5 million seed round is modest compared to competitors like Wild Bioscience ($60M Series A) and Tropic (€91.3M Series C), which are also racing to engineer climate-resilient crops. While OlsAro emphasizes its non-GM approach for broader market access, the ultimate test will be its ability to meet aggressive market entry timelines, such as reaching the Bangladesh market by 2027, which remains unconfirmed in the latest announcement.

Key Facts

• Company: OlsAro
• Amount: €5M
• Round: Seed
• Investors: Industrifonden (lead), Nordic Foodtech VC, Future Food Fund, AgFunder, GU Ventures, PINC
• Founder: Elén Faxö
• Sector: Climate-Resilient Crop Genetics
• Headquarters: Gothenburg, Sweden