Every day, Global University Venturing rounds up the smaller investments from across the university innovation ecosystem in its deal net.
OroraTech, a Germany-based wildfire detection and monitoring services provider based on research at TU Munich, has raised €5.8m ($7m) in a series A round co-led by Findus Venture and Ananda Impact Ventures, with contributions from APEX Ventures, Bayern Kapital and assorted angel investors. The money will allow OroraTech to launch its first satellite, which will collect thermal-infrared data to monitor wildfires, and to scale its geospatial data analysis platform. Private investor Martin Weiss led a seed round of undisclosed size in December 2019, with participation from other individual backers. The seed round reportedly brought OroraTech’s total financing to $1.8m.
Chromologics, a Denmark-based spinout from Technical University of Denmark developing natural fungal colourants, has added €4m ($4.9m) from investors including Novo Seeds, a subsidiary of pharmaceutical firm Novo, to a seed round that now totals approximately $7.3m. Blue Horizon Ventures, Nordic Food Tech and angel investor Giampaolo Cagnin also contributed to the extension, which followed earlier funding from state-owned growth fund Vækstfonden.
Impetus Agriculture, a US-based insect control products developer, has raised $1m in seed capital co-led by BioGenerator and Yield Lab, with participation from University of Missouri’s student-run vehicle Allen Angel Capital Education Fund, angel syndicates St Louis Arch Angels and Centennial Investors, and public-private partnership Missouri Technology Corp, according to the St Louis Business Journal. The money will allow Impetus to accelerate its product development. The company has now raised $2.3m, according to the report. It had secured $915,000 towards a $1.3m target in January 2021, according to a securities document, but it is unclear whether that was a first close of the seed round. Impetus was co-founded by BioGenerator, Yield Lab and seed supplier KWS’s corporate venturing arm. KWS is the majority shareholder of Impetus, according to its website.
EditForce, a Japan-based creator of DNA and RNA drug development technology, secured an undisclosed amount from telecoms firm KDDI’s Open Innovation Fund and VC firm Global Brain on Wednesday. and University of Tokyo Edge Capital (UTEC) and chemical producer Kisco had invested $1.5m in the company in 2016 before it added $7.8m in March 2019 from UTEC and Itochu Technology Ventures, a subsidiary of trading group Itochu, as well as energy utility Kansai Electric Power’s K4 Ventures unit, QB Capital, Newton Biocapital and Japan’s Science and Technology Agency.
EcoNavista, a Japan-based spinout of Osaka City University that has created a sleep analysis system called LifeRhythmNavi+Dr for use in senior care, raised an undisclosed amount of funding from consumer electronics producer Sony’s Innovation Fund and gas utility Tokyo Gas. The spinout received undisclosed amounts from Tokyo Gas in 2018 and real estate brokerage Hulic in February 2020.
– Additional reporting by Liwen-Edison Fu and Robert Lavine
Thierry Heles
Thierry Heles is the editor of Global University Venturing, host of the Beyond the Breakthrough interview podcast and responsible for the monthly GUV Gazette (sign up here for free).
