Japan-headquartered biofuel supplier Euglena has formed a startup investment and partnership scheme dubbed Euglena Sustainable Ventures.
The initiative will target companies in sectors including bioinformatics, direct-to-consumer and healthcare technology, as well as other strategic areas relevant to the company.
Euglena Sustainable Ventures has made its first investment, providing an undisclosed amount for βace (also known as Bace), the Japan-based owner of chocolate brand Minimal, which uses fair trade-sourced cacao beans to produce its confectionery products.
Euglena had already conducted direct investments in companies including bioinformatics software provider Amelieff, regional basketball league Ryukyu Golden Kings, customer-to-customer food portal Pocket Marché and MedCare, the operator of health insurance management platform Medically.
The company has also been making venture capital investments through investment firm Real Tech Holdings, which it co-founded in 2015 as a joint venture with research firm Leave a Nest and investment firm SMBC Nikko.
