Agritech startup Loopworm raises $3.4 million in seed funding led by Omnivore, WaterBridge

On August 24, the agritech startup Loopworm announced that it had secured $3.4 million in seed funding from investors led by Omnivore and WaterBridge Ventures. Titan Capital was joined in this round by angel investors such as Nadir Godrej of Godrej Agrovet, Sanjiv Rangrass, formerly of ITC, and Akshay Singhal of Log9 Materials.

In a statement, Loopworm explained that it intends to invest the seed money in staffing, R&D (including the construction of laboratories), and the opening of a production facility in North Bengaluru.

Loopworm is an insect biotech startup founded in 2019 by two IITians named Ankit Alok Bagaria and Abhi Gawri that seeks to optimize insect farming for smallholders while also producing nutrients and ingredients for B2B customers. The company says that by using multi-species insect biotechnology, it will change many industries, such as aquaculture, pet food, and nutraceuticals.

We are overjoyed to have the backing of such seasoned investors as Omnivore, Waterbridge, Titan Capital, and a host of angels, among them Nadir Godrej. Bagaria and Gawri said in a joint statement, "We plan to use the new funding to set up our first Loop Factory in North Bengaluru, hire talent, and accelerate R&D."

Loopworm also mentioned that it is working with smallholder farmers to construct distributed insect rearing facilities. Within the next five years, the agritech startup aims to produce 3,00,000 metric tonnes (MT) of sustainable insect-based protein annually, thereby creating value from 7.5 million MT of food waste and agricultural byproducts.

As part of our OmniX Bio initiative, which aims to pave the way for the agrifood life sciences in India, Omnivore is thrilled to support Loopworm. The Managing Partner of Omnivore, Mark Kahn, has remarked on the enormous potential that Loopworm sees in developing cultivated insects into high-quality nutrients and ingredients.

The venture capital firm OmniX Bio launched in December 2021 to help agri-food life science startups. According to Loopworm's announcement, this is Omnivore's second investment as part of the programme.

Omnivore has recently launched its third fund with a target corpus of $130 million to invest in early-stage startups creating technologies for agriculture, food, and the rural economy.

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