Omnivore raises $97 million for its second fund

BENGALURU: Omnivore Partners, an early-stage venture investment firm, has raised $97 million for its second fund, higher than the targeted $75 million, signalling rising interest by global investors in backing impact investment funds out of India.

Several investors, including UK’s CDC Group, Dutch development bank FMO, Swiss Investment Fund for Emerging Markets, Belgian Investment Company for Developing Countries, BASF Venture Capital, Japan-based Mistletoe and various family offices, chipped in for this round.

Omnivore, which invests in early-stage impact startups focused on using technology to transform agriculture, has made five investments — with cheque sizes ranging from $500,000 to $4 million — from its second fund till date. This includes Doodhwala — a subscription-based delivery platform for essentials sourced from local farms and dairies; TartanSense, which is developing small robots for small farms, and Intello Labs — which uses AI tools to build a platform for grading and quality monitoring of agricultural commodities. “We want to support entrepreneurs who are working to disrupt food systems across India, making agriculture more profitable, stable and sustainable,” said Mark Kahn, managing partner, Omnivore.


Despite being centred around smallholder farmers, India’s agricultural economy represents around one-fifth of the national GDP and employs almost half of the country’s workforce, he said. The country has the second-largest arable land area in the world, with around 200 million people involved in agriculture.