Packaged food producer Fazer Group has led a €18.5m ($20.7m) series A round for Finland-based protein powder developer Solar Foods and now owns a 15% stake in the company.
The corporate led a €15m second tranche of the round that included CPT Capital, the venture capital arm of Jeremy Coller’s family office, as well as VC firm Lifeline Ventures, investment platform Agronomics and a vehicle called Bridford Investments.
The additional capital was added to €3.5m in convertible note financing the company raised from Fazer, Lifeline Ventures, family office Holdix and its Turret affiliate in September 2019, at the same time as it signed a strategic partnership agreement with Fazer.
Solar Foods is the developer of Solein, a protein it creates by applying electricity to water and adding microbes along with ammonia it sources from the air. It claims the protein is far more carbon neutral than animal or plant-based proteins.
The technology builds on research conducted at VTT Technical Research Center of Finland and Lappeenranta University of Technology (LUT). Solar Foods has earmarked the series A proceeds for construction of a planned production facility.
Lifeline Ventures had previously led the company’s $2.5m seed round in March 2018, a round that included VTT’s early-stage investment arm, VTT Ventures, and Green Campus Innovations, a vehicle that backs LUT cleantech research at seed stage.
