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Meet the Founder: Kelp & Co.

Seaweed is a global resource with untapped potential for human and animal health, as well as environmental sustainability. Yet, for all its promise, there's a significant gap between scientific research and commercial application. Kelp & Co. is an exciting early-stage venture dedicated to bridging this gap by demonstrating the versatility and economic potential of New Zealand seaweed.The idea for Kelp & Co. came from a personal mission. Juliet Linzmeier wanted to find a career that bene...

Meet the Founder: NanoSoils Bio

Growers are losing time and money as seeds take longer to germinate and stored stock loses viability. When seed emergence stretches from days to weeks, a single dry spell or cold snap can wipe out a planting, and unsold seed often goes to waste. NanoSoils Bio was founded to change that. Led by Dr Cong Vu, the team is adapting nanoparticle delivery to carry active ingredients directly to seeds, aiming for faster and more reliable germination in the field, as well as longer storage life.Meet the f...

Meet the Founder: Picka

Kiwifruit is a cornerstone of New Zealand's horticulture industry, but it faces a growing challenge: maximising post-harvest fruit quality while maintaining a skilled workforce. With the industry expected to significantly increase its production by 2030, a new approach to harvesting is needed. Meet the founders of Picka, one of the ventures participating in the Sprout Accelerator Spring25 Cohort, who are tackling this problem head-on with an autonomous, robotic picking assistant. The three ...

Meet the Founder: Computerised Equine Bit

For a horse rider, the bit is an important point of communication with their horse. Yet, this critical tool provides almost no objective feedback, leaving riders to rely on subjective guesswork to understand their horse’s reactions, comfort, or stress.Meet Stefan Hadži-Longinović, the founder of Computerised Equine Bit, one of the ventures taking part in the Sprout Accelerator Spring25 Cohort. His venture, Computerised Equine Bit, is bridging the gap between sensor technology and animal welf...

Meet the Founder: Advanced Mineral Solutions

For Garret Huelson, the inspiration for Advanced Mineral Solutions came from a leisurely drive past Lake Waikare in 2017. The lake's bright green colour struck him, then a month later, he observed an unnatural purple, both a clear sign of an ecosystem overwhelmed by an algae bloom. After extensive research and conversations with local government authorities, Garret was inspired to find a way to help restore New Zealand's lakes and transform a toxic environmental problem into a viable and valuabl...

Meet the Founder: Wingman

Dairy farmers in New Zealand and around the world continuously endeavour to improve the quality of their herds. Sometimes, evaluation systems prioritise production efficiency at the expense of crucial traits like udders and fertility, leaving farmers with herds that don't meet their needs. Meet Wingman, one of the ventures taking part in the Sprout Accelerator Spring25 Cohort, who are providing an independent solution for dairy herd genetic improvement.Wingman's core idea came about from Mark Be...

Meet the Founder: Twenty Eightish

For Olivia Trilford, the inspiration for her venture wasn't just a market gap - it was a deeply personal journey. Olivia's personal struggle with endometriosis drove her to seek less aggressive, supplementary ways to nurture her health. As a mother of twin daughters and stepmum to three, with a "chaotic, busy life," she was looking for a convenient, supportive product that simply didn't exist. So, she decided to create it herself. Meet the founders of Twenty Eightish, a venture in the Sprou...

Meet the Founder: AiWorx

A single kiwifruit orchard can have over a million flowers, each requiring precise pollination to produce high-quality fruit. Yet, traditional pollination methods, relying on bees, hand-dusting, or even manual hand pollination, can be inefficient and vulnerable to climate change and disease. Meet the founders, Dr Shujjat Khan and Dr Jibran Tahir of AiWorx, one of the ventures participating in the Sprout Accelerator Spring25 Cohort, who are tackling this challenge by working on an intelligen...

Meet the Founder: Neutectic Solutions

The journey to creating Neutectic Solutions began with a large, global problem: marine biofouling. Biofouling is the costly build-up of organisms on submerged surfaces, and current solutions are highly toxic to the environment and to aquatic life. The idea emerged from a funded science programme at the Bioeconomy Science Institute, aimed at solving problems for New Zealand's open ocean aquaculture. Meet the founders of Neutectic Solutions, one of 18 exciting ventures participating in the Sp...

Data and AI in the Future of Agrifood Innovation

Reflecting on the conversations from the 2025 Sprout Summit earlier this year, I am more excited than ever for the opportunities for technology within the agrifood value chain. From pasture to supermarket aisle, increased data utilisation and adoption of AI technology is set to unlock enormous value. McKinsey projects that full connectivity and digitisation in agriculture could contribute up to US $500 billion in annual GDP by 2030, while Google has estimated that agrifood companies adopting AI ...

Largest Sprout Accelerator Cohort Set to Ignite the Future of Global Agrifood Innovation

From ground-breaking applications of AI and robotics to advancements in sustainable materials, bio-based solutions, and environmental monitoring, the Sprout Accelerator Spring25 Cohort represents an exciting future for the global agrifood value chain.We are excited to welcome our largest cohort yet, with 18 innovative early-stage ventures joining us on their entrepreneurial journey to discover, articulate and refine the foundations to grow their startup. Despite more spots being available in the...

Quantum Computing: The Next Frontier in Agrifood Technology

Modern agriculture has undergone a digital transformation over the last decade, with the rise of Internet of Things (IoT) and, more recently, the explosion of Artificial Intelligence (AI). However, a technology that is poised to further reshape and dramatically progress the industry is quantum computing. At the recent Sprout Summit in Auckland, AI and emerging technologies like quantum computing took centre stage, with experts and industry leaders discussing how these tools could drive the next...

Building Agrifood Innovation from the Ground Up: Talent, Teams, and the Power of Networks

In the fast-evolving world of agrifood innovation and generally in the world of innovation and startups, talent is the most precious resource, and often the scarcest. As climate, technology, and market dynamics reshape our global food systems, the startups best equipped to lead this change are those who build not only the right products but the right people and networks around them. It is the people and entrepreneurs who attract the capital and investments, followed by the technology and market....

Bontia Bio Secures NZ$1.25m To Launch World-first Tech That Taps Into The Protective Power Of Plants

Kiwi biotechnology company Bontia Bio has announced a NZ$1.25m seed funding round led by Sprout Agritech and supported by KiwiSaver provider Booster NZ’s Innovation Fund, with a $750k repayable grant from Callaghan Innovation, to support the development of natural anti-parasitic treatments that address a growing need for safe, effective and environmentally sustainable solutions in animal health. Bontia Bio’s technology is a world-first method for producing powerful natural compounds found in...

Sprout Invests in POP to Drive a New Era of Personalised Pet Wellness

The pet wellness industry, valued at over $100 billion globally, is booming, with an increasing number of pet owners seeking ways to extend the health and lifespan of their beloved animals. As the demand for scientifically backed, personalised pet care grows, New Zealand-based Sprout Agritech has announced its latest pre-seed investment in POP, a company redefining pet wellness with innovative, science-backed solutions.Founded by Alan Tsui, Gigi Ng, and Lauren Bonds, POP’s flagship product, PO...

Meet the Founder: Radio With Pictures

Internal health diagnostic tools are expensive, slow, and often invasive. Anyone who has undergone an internal health diagnostic method—CT, colonoscopy, or MRI—knows this all too well. While most people accept this as the status quo, Debbie Berg and Shane Leath were unsatisfied and determined to change it. So, this duo of AgResearch scientists set out to create a solution. Radio With Pictures, a Sprout Accelerator Spring24 Cohort venture, has developed a portable health diagnosis d...

Meet the Founder: Lozano Group

Cultivating fruit is essential to nourishing and sustaining life on Earth, and a crucial aspect of this process lies in how we store and transport it from farm to table. Currently, significant energy is wasted every harvest cooling and storing fruit due to the inefficiencies of standard packaging systems. These systems do not make the best use of storage environments, leading to a reduction in fruit quality and the excess use of energy resources.This leads to the question: what if we could do th...

Meet the Founder: Ingenum

In the race to secure global food supplies and protect livestock, imagine a ‘ChatGPT’ for biological signs that could help detect animal health diseases before they become catastrophic. Meet Ingenum co-founders Tom Brownlie and Christopher Liang working together to pioneer an innovative AI model to target disease detection in agriculture. A participant of the Sprout Accelerator Spring24 cohort, Ingenum is a venture who has a big ambitious goal: solve global problems in animal health and revo...

Meet the Founder: Kelvius

Industrial Process heat is a hidden but significant contributor to climate change, accounting for a staggering 40% of global energy consumption and responsible for 34% of the world’s carbon emissions.Industrial Process heat is the heat used to make products or materials in factories and plants. For example, converting milk into powder, wood pulp into paper or packaging, and producing metals and chemicals. Many of these industrial heat applications use fossil fuels, like gas and coal, to genera...

Meet the Founder: Stockies

Every livestock transaction carries an unseen cost: valuable information that never gets to market.Buying and selling livestock is often risky due to limited information shared during transactions. Despite the high-value trades, buying stock with insufficient data is like buying a farm without seeing the back paddock. This can lead to surprises and headaches for stock agents and farmers alike.Imagine creating a comprehensive livestock listing and being able to immediately share it with a trusted...

Meet the Founder: ESP Medical

What if mastitis could be safely prevented rather than just treated?This is the question Sprout Accelerator Spring24 cohort participant Hillary Sharp and her team at ESP Medical have been tackling for the past two years. With a recent move away from blanket antibiotic treatment, teat sealant has provided an alternative prevention management tool. However, it causes headaches when administered and also disrupts the supply chain, from creating unsightly black spots in cheese to clogging up milking...

Meet the Founder: Biotremology

Imagine playing a carefully curated Spotify playlist in your garden to actively repel harmful pests and insects from your plants. No pesticides. No residues. Simply good vibrations working hard to keep the unwanted pests at bay while allowing beneficial ones to thrive. It’s a blend of nature and technology, creating a vibrant environment where plants can flourish while reducing the need for traditional pest control methods.This innovative vision is no longer a fantasy; it’s a reality br...

Meet the Founder: EVVE

In the wake of COVID-19, global investment in human vaccines has surged, but the animal health sector hasn’t received the same level of attention. This gap is leaving farmers to grapple with costly inefficiencies and unmet needs.In particular, the industry is falling behind in producing effective vaccines for diseases that require a strong cell-based immune response, such as Salmonella, or where long-term immunity is needed, ultimately reducing the need for frequent booster shots. Existing vac...

Meet the Founder: Niclosavir

In the face of a growing crisis in animal health and human medicine, Niclosavir Limited is on a mission to combat antimicrobial resistance (AMR) with innovative solutions that repurpose an old Bayer drug. This bold venture aims to revolutionise the treatment of bovine mastitis—one of the leading causes of antibiotic use in New Zealand's dairy industry.Driven by a seasoned team with over 200 years of combined experience, this Sprout Accelerator Spring24 venture is determined to leave a solution...

Meet the Founder: Ocean Intelligence

In today’s data-driven world, should marine farmers still rely on traditional methods to know what’s happening on their farms?Meet Ocean Intelligence, one of the ventures participating in the Sprout Accelerator Spring24 cohort, they are on a mission to make aquaculture more sustainable, efficient, and profitable.For years, marine farmers have farmed based on instinct and traditional farming methods, often diving deep—both literally and metaphorically—to gather insights about their operat...