Sustainable food and agriculture venture fund is launched

Seed 2 Growth Ventures (S2G) was launched today as a new food and agriculture venture fund.

The goal of the fund, the largest of its kind in the United States, is to catalyze innovation to meet demands for healthy, sustainable and local food. Seed 2 Growth Ventures already has initial investments with multiple companies, including Mercaris, ShopWell, MycoTechnology, Maple Hill Creamery, Beyond Meat, Sweetgreen, Midwestern BioAg, and Shenandoah Growers.

"We're seeing tectonic shifts in the food industry that consumers are driving. People want better tasting, more nutritious, healthy and sustainable food. The problem is our existing food system is designed to produce cheap calories, and it is not designed to supply healthy, sustainable and affordable nutrition at scale," Victor Friedberg, Seed 2 Growth Ventures co-founder and managing director, said. "This provides a great opportunity for innovators and investors, and S2G is seizing the opportunity."

Chuck Templeton, founder and former CEO of OpenTable, and Sanjeev Krishnan, an investor of venture and growth companies, joined Friedberg as the team making investment decisions for Seed 2 Growth.

"This $1.4 trillion sector is undergoing massive change and is under-invested with risk capital," Krishnan said. "We think our approach of understanding the system from 'soil to shelf' is a unique and proactive way to create value, minimize risk and feed the changing consumer."