Anterra Capital, a specialist venture firm investing in food and agriculture, today announced its $100 million first close of Fund III. Founded in 2013 with offices in Amsterdam and Boston, the firm manages over $500 million across three funds. Anterra invests in and builds companies that apply life-science and software innovations to food and agriculture. The Fund III's first close marks an important milestone for Anterra.
The firm was built on the conviction that the tools that had already transformed other industries - life science tools that reshaped human health, and software that rewired sectors from logistics to financial services - would eventually transition to, and transform, food and agriculture.
"The firm has now successfully navigated two capital cycles in food and agriculture," said Maarten Goossens, Partner at Anterra Capital.
"Each one rewarded the same discipline: backing companies that deliver real returns for their customers and to their investors. What's different this time is that the real-world industries we operate in - large, complex and historically resistant to change - are now ready to be rewired, and the tools to do it have arrived."
Food and agriculture remains the largest industry on the planet, roughly $10 trillion in size, employing around 1.3 billion people, nearly 40 per cent of the world's workforce. It is also where a set of structural forces converges - margin volatility, food security, climate and water constraints, tightening regulation, and health outcomes increasingly tied to what the system produces - each a reason the old way of operating no longer holds.
Global investment in food and agriculture technology surged to a historical peak of nearly $52 billion in 2021 before falling back to roughly $16 billion - 2016 levels.
Much of that generalist capital backed ambitious, capital-intensive bets that failed to scale: indoor vertical farms, plant-based processed meat alternatives and 10-minute grocery delivery.
Anterra took a different approach - backing science-backed companies built on real unit economics and designed to scale through existing industry channels. That retreat of capital from hype back to fundamentals is precisely what now opens the door for disciplined specialists. Anterra's investment thesis has been consistent across two funds - and with valuations reset and AI now changing the economics of building in both software and biology, the moment has finally arrived to deploy it at scale.
"We've spent twelve years and two funds proving you can build category-defining companies in food and agriculture - and generate real returns doing it," said Brett Wong, Partner at Anterra Capital.
"What's changed is that the world has finally caught up to that thesis. The technology is here, the valuations make sense, and the founders building in this sector are the best we've ever seen. This is the most exciting moment in our firm's history, and Fund III is how we intend to make the most of it."
Lead image: Anterra Capital partners. Photo: Anterra Capital.