AgTech Innovators season 3

Speaker 1:

Welcome to AgTech Innovators, keeping you up to date with information from Agriculture Victoria.

Drew Radford:

The AgTech sector encompasses researchers, start-ups, and investors, just to name a few. They're all crucial parts of a complex global innovation network. However, for that network to successfully meet the challenges of feeding the world, it needs to be connected.

G'day, I'm Drew Radford and growAG is focused on pulling the threads of that network together. Their role is connecting the agrifood innovation community across Asia Pacific and around the world. Arianna Sippel is senior manager with growAG, and to discuss how they do that, she joins me for this AgTech Innovators podcast. Thanks for your time.

Arianna Sippel:

Thank you very much, Drew.

Drew Radford:

Arianna, you've had quite a long background in terms of AgTech. In fact, you have a global perspective with it because I understand your career, well, didn't quite start with, but you spent some time with Austrade as part of their global AgTech strategy.

Arianna Sippel:

Yes, I was privileged enough to be working with Austrade in the agribusiness and food sector when agritech and that innovation and the opportunities around that really started to emerge here in Australia. And so many really interesting companies coming through and so much research from the different research organisations across Australia, and also real interest in what was coming out of Australia from different markets around the world. And so an opportunity to really help draw those different groups together and help try and set up the Australian ecosystem to be a really thriving successful ecosystem and industry in its own right.

Drew Radford:

You're certainly walking the talk there because your role now is with AgriFutures. For those unfamiliar, what's AgriFutures do?

Arianna Sippel:

So AgriFutures is one of the 15 Research Development Corporations (RDCs) (Research and Development Corporation) (Research and Development Corporation) (Research and Development Corporation) (Research and Development Corporation) that exists in Australia, and so what most of us do is we take levies from producers, so we match that with federal government funding and the RDCs invest that on behalf of those industries to really help those agricultural industries thrive and grow and be successful. Here in Australia, we export around two-thirds of what we produce, so that innovative edge is really important for helping us both be productive, competitive, and sustainable as climates and environments change over time.

Drew Radford:

Well, you've taken, I would argue, the next step in that in terms of being really at the pointy end, because your role is with growAG. How's that different? What's that specific focus there?
Arianna Sippel:It's part of AgriFuture's focus on global innovation networks and how we can really supercharge those and help ensure that Australia is both a leader in accessing as well as adopting, developing, and exporting agrifood technologies and innovation. You might say, "Well, why are we doing this?" Because we see that that really healthy, thriving ecosystem is really key to having Australian producers be able to have early access to new innovations and the right innovations for them, and having that capacity here in Australia to be able to really deliver those things to producers so that they can be really successful.

Drew Radford:

You said a couple of key words there. You said ecosystem and you also said network, and I go onto your website and those terms draw the threads together for me because I see just all these amazing stories, like the six big things that are going to come towards us that are going to change agriculture is one of the stories, and they've got sub stories under there, but I'm looking at it and going, they're great stories, but I'm working out also that you're pulling the threads together there. You're saying there's researchers, there's investors, there's technologies. Is that what's going on? You're trying to collate all of this under one roof?

Arianna Sippel:

Absolutely. We're trying to pull all those threads together so that it's really easy for anyone, whether they're in Victoria or in Australia or around the world, to be able to find and connect with relevant groups here in Australia and relevant opportunities. And so there's around 3,000 research opportunities that you can jump into and see, well, who has that expertise if I wanted to reach out and connect and collaborate? You can see what are some of those opportunities that are coming through, and so if you're a startup, you might see some research projects you can tap into. You might see some other startups who are doing something interesting that's complimentary to your solution and you can reach out and then go and partner, and at the end of the day, deliver a package solution to producers or other users that will be more attractive and more compelling because it's easier to digest. If you're a researcher, you can find those research collaboration opportunities.

If you're a corporate, or an investor, or a scale-up perhaps, you can see, what are the things that I could be investing in? What are those groups at an early stage and be able to reach out. What are those innovations that, again, I can pull through into my business or I can connect to my investee companies as well. How do we make it easy for people to do that? The last kind of offer, and this is probably the most powerful, I think, is for those groups who are active in the ecosystem, they can also put up their own opportunity. So they can say, "This is what I'm seeking, this is who I'm seeking to do that with, and this is what I see them doing with that." So it might be, "I'm start-up. I'm seeking strategic partners. I'm seeking investors. This is what those groups look like, and here's a little bit about my journey to date, what I'm offering, the traction I've had, and how I'd like to collaborate and work with you."

Drew Radford:

Okay. Well, using that example then, how does somebody do that? Is that like a message board space that you've got in under those plethora of stories, or is it a breakout area?
Arianna Sippel:So if people jump on the site, growag.com, it's a really easy to search website. So there's a search bar at the top so you can explore away and see what's on there. You can get a sense of the types of opportunities and the types of calls that people make. Also on the top right-hand side of the platform, there's another tab that says Submit. So if you jump onto Submit, you can then submit your own profile, you can submit an opportunity, and that will come through to us and we'll reach out and have a chat with you about, "Can we tweak a little bit?" If you'd rather have a conversation first, you can always send through a general inquiry,,,,, and we'll set up a time. We've got a live concierge that sits behind the platform that helps people to really drill down and understand how can they use it, how can they get the most out of it.

Drew Radford:

What do you see as some of the biggest challenges and opportunities startups face in the Victorian AgTech industry and the industry as a whole?

Arianna Sippel:

One of the really obvious ones that is really front and centre for me is, how do you go beyond your immediate networks if you're wanting to do customer discovery and market validation, or if you're wanting to say, identify some of those strategic partners that can help you scale. It might be, how do I take my idea or my tech from ideas accelerator or perhaps from a lab, to being something that I can actually see, this is how I'm going to transform that idea, that piece of tech into something in field or in market. And so finding those partners that can help you sanity check and future-proof and think about, what's the right business model? Is this viable? Who might be my end customer? All those key ideas, you can find those partners through the platform.
You can also raise capital. You can find research collaborators or complementary solutions. You can also say, "Hey, I'm wanting to go global. I'm wanting to find potential partners in this particular market or that particular market." And through the platform, we have around 16,000 subscribers. We send out opportunity updates every fortnight so people can see what are those new opportunities coming through, and they can jump on and put an inquiry in about those ones that they're really interested in. So that's certainly one of the big challenges I see, how to go beyond your immediate networks and validate what you're thinking about and find those potential partners. People often say you've got to kiss a few frogs along the way, but beyond your immediate pond, how do you find the lakes and the oceans and how do you navigate some of those things?

One of the other things I think is, if you're a start-up, really tying down the detail around your business model can be just as important as your technology. Getting to the bones of who is actually your customer, who is going to be willing to pay for what you're doing, and what's your path to market there is really key. Obviously, it's also, what is your technology or service or solution, what's your offer around that, and really understanding what's interesting or differentiating about what you are offering. And what's your hook? What's your value proposition to those customers? But certainly I think that business model question is a really important one for groups to nail.

Drew Radford:

You deal with the nation, but from a Victorian perspective, in your experience, what are the most promising areas within the Victorian AgTech sector that you see?

Arianna Sippel:

Look, I will give probably a little bit of an agnostic view here. It's not a particular sector, but what are the solutions that are going to solve big, chunky problems that Victoria, that Australia, that the world are grappling with at the moment? So one of those is a lot around, how do you manage product shelf life? How do you deal with waste and how can you create more value and help everyone on the supply chain realise more value? So whether that solution's looking at, say, extending shelf life or valorising byproduct streams.

So if you are producing almonds or you're producing hazelnuts, what have you, what do you do with the shell? How do you add value there? If you are producing a leafy vegetable, there's a certain piece that goes to market and is sold and there's a whole lot of other green biomass that is essentially waste. So what's the best way of getting some value from that? If you're a rice producer, what do you do with the rice straw? You've harvested the rice, but can you do something else with the rice straw? So the whole lot of different opportunities there that I think are really interesting about how we create more value and more sustainability all the way along the supply chain.

Couple of those other really big, chunky issues that everyone grapples with, workforce. Solutions that help producers focus their workforce on more complex tasks or that reduce work health and safety issues, they're really key and certainly help us make the most of our workforce so that we end up with higher-value products at the end of the day and more sustainable business models as well.

I think the other thing that we need to be thinking about is solutions that help producers manage biosecurity and manage pest and disease and retain market access at the same time. So there's a lot of noise in the media around different chemicals or different families of the chemicals having short market access lives might be the way of putting it, but what's next? What are those alternate biologicals or integrated pest management solutions that people might be able to take on? How do we validate those? How do we trial those, and how do we find things that are fit for us here, whether in Victoria or Australia more broadly?

Drew Radford:

Do you have three tips for startups that you'd like to share?

Arianna Sippel:

Yeah, I've already talked about the business model piece. It really is such an important piece around thinking about your business and who is your business targeting, and what does that then mean about how you structure your business, and who do you go and target, and what kind of support might you need to have. So I think that business model piece and understanding who your customer is so important.

The other two tips I'd have is when you're thinking about your competitive landscape, don't just think about your direct competitors. Try and think really laterally around, what are the other solutions? What are the other services? What are the other factors that someone thinking about whether they might use my solution or whether my solution is relevant or interesting? What are the other things that are going to be on their plate that they're going to be thinking about, because that is who you're going to compete against. It's a bit like if you're a David Jones or a Myer or whatever. Your competitors are not just each other. They're small specialty shops, they're online sales. It's a much broader piece. Or it's also what a different sentiments around consumer spending and so on.

Third tip would be understand what you can tap into without giving equity away. As a startup, you really need to retain enough skin in the game that you and your team are still motivated to get up and go for it each and every day. It can be a really hard long slog, so take a look at what some of those different government and ecosystem supports are that are available. There's some really great programs, particularly in Victoria. If you take a look at, say, the LaunchVic programs, many of those are in partnership with AgVic, but there's also some industry agnostic ones that you might want to take a look at. Breakthrough Victoria as well have some different models that look to see what's available. Similarly, there's a whole lot of different accelerators, but there's also a whole lot of regional support mechanisms that can really help you to get further and figure out more about what you need to do to structure your business and to advance your technology or solution that can get you further.

If you're still in the research phase, if you have someone in your team who's involved with a research organisation, you can look at things like CSIRO's On Prime Accelerator, for instance, that really helps you develop some of those tools and helps connect you into different networks. So, take a look at all those sorts of things. What can you tap into that's not going to reduce your equity, that can get you a little bit further and extend those relationships and those connections as well.

Drew Radford:

Arianna, what do you see are the challenges and opportunities for investors in the future?
Arianna Sippel:There's a couple of things for investors in the future, other than try to keep an eye on the local and global pulse in terms of where there's still value as opposed to different segments getting over-hyped in different spots. But I think certainly for investors being able to be connected to their peers, both locally, whether that's in Melbourne, say, or in Victoria or in Australia, or across different markets. So perhaps between Australia and New Zealand, Australia and US, Australia, Singapore, etc. How do we make that easier that people can find those good partners and those partners that they can collaborate with to look at and then help their investees to go further and to really be able to scale? Because I do think particularly for Australian startups, often they will need to look to go global if they're going to really thrive and really be competitive.

So for investors, how do you help your startups do that? How do you also educate the startups and the researchers coming through? And look, this is probably one that's a little bit for those accelerators and different groups out there, but also at the end of the day for investors. How do you help educate the startups and the research groups that are coming through to understand what VC has to offer or your angel group or your corporate VC or your family office or whatever.

Because they all come with different benefits or different attributes and different opportunity costs, so it's really about finding the match for someone who's going to be on the same wavelength and receptive to the opportunities that you can provide. So how do we have that happen more broadly across the ecosystem?

Drew Radford:

I would argue, Arianna, that you and the team at growAg are helping enormously make those matches, those collaborations all happen through the work that you do. Arianna Sippel, Senior manager with growAg, thanks for joining me for this AgTech Innovators podcast.

Arianna Sippel:

Thank you very much, Drew.

Speaker 1:

Thank you for listening to AgTech Innovators. For more episodes in this series, find us and follow us wherever you get your podcasts. We’d love to hear your feedback, so please leave a comment or rating, and share this series with your friends and family.

All information is accurate at the time of release. Contact Agriculture Victoria or your consultant before making any changes on-farm. This podcast was developed by Agriculture Victoria, authorised by the Victorian Government, Melbourne.

Speaker 1:

Welcome to AgTech Innovators. Keeping you up to date with information from Agriculture Victoria.

Drew Radford:

The global agrifood innovation system is complex. It’s comprised of everything from researchers to entrepreneurs, through to investors. Each are cogs in the large AgTech machine. How though do you make sure that that machine is running smoothly?

G’day. I'm Drew Radford, and Beanstalk greases those cogs in its role as food and agriculture innovation advisory and venture builder. To discuss what that means and how it works, Justin Ahmed is Director at Beanstalk, and he joins me for this AgTech Innovators podcast. Justin, thanks for your time.

Justin Ahmed:

Thanks for having me, Drew.

Drew Radford:

Justin, you've got a lot of dust on your boots from agriculture, literally from all around the globe, haven't you?

Justin Ahmed:

Yeah, I do. I'm originally from California, but across my career I've been fortunate enough to live and work in a lot of different contexts. Spent some early part of my career in the agricultural development space, working on USAID [United States Agency for International Development] and Gates Foundation, Syngenta Foundation focused projects in technology transfer for smallholder farmers in South Asia, particularly Bangladesh and East Africa.

I've spent the years following that actually in the management consulting space, helping them to build their agricultural analytics hub. So based out of Boston and New York, serving clients around North America and the globe on digital strategy in the agriculture space. And I've been fortunate enough to move to Melbourne mid-pandemic, the end of 2020 with my family, where we've been ever since.

Drew Radford:

Wow, that’s quite a bit of globe hopping, to say the least, Justin. And what I take away from that too is you've seen the firsthand impact of AgTech on developing countries, but all across the agricultural sector. You really get it, for want of a better description.

Justin Ahmed:

Yeah, I’d like to think so. Maybe from an observer, an external standpoint in a way, not as a producer myself, but I've been fortunate to see the different impact that digital, physical, equipment-based or biological solutions can have in a whole range of different contexts. Whether that’s a quarter-acre farmer in Kenya or a 5,000 hectare operation in the plains of Canada.

Drew Radford:

Justin, Beanstalk, you are working with them now. I've seen a line describing the organisation as, ‘We serve as grease in the wheels of the global agri-innovation ecosystem’. That's a big sentence. What’s it mean?

Justin Ahmed:

We also like to say that we aim to unleash the potential for agriculture to be a leading force for good. We are not technology developers in a way, and nor are we producers. We sit somewhere in the middle.

We are passionate about helping producers, agribusinesses, governments to leverage the power of technology to build a more sustainable and productive food system. That means anything from supporting primary producers and corporate agribusinesses to build out and execute their own innovation strategies, building capability and capacity to understand and conduct diligence on technology that they’re providing in their operations, all the way to supporting governments and the public institutions to define how they can help to support the growth of an agricultural technology ecosystem.

Drew Radford:

That's a very broad working space to say the least, Justin. So maybe you could give some examples. Now, what sort of specific programs or initiatives has Beanstalk implemented to foster the growth of AgTech startups in Victoria and abroad?

Justin Ahmed:

A big focus of mine at Beanstalk is actually developing the agricultural ecosystem in Southeast Asia and the connectivity between Australia and Southeast Asian nations in that way.

One of the programs we’ve been implementing for the last four years now has been something called the Graft Challenge Program. This is an open innovation program that we've deployed in Australia, in India, in Vietnam, and Papua New Guinea. We like to call it a land-and-launch program. We work with local agribusinesses to define common challenges that plague their industry, help them understand what kind of technology and support can play a role in shifting the needle on those, and then go and engage recruits and bring on technology providers from around the world, help them to establish commercial relationships and foundations in those markets.

So just to put that in a bit more detail, 2021 with the support of the Australian government and some local agribusinesses, we deployed a program called the Graft Challenge Vietnam. We worked with stakeholders and agribusinesses in the piggery space who were trying to solve for disease control solutions, the horticultural space solving for basically challenges like mango exportability to Europe, and in the shrimp and aquaculture sector who are looking to manage water quality and other challenges.

We brought in 9 different technology providers from 7 different countries, helped them to adapt their technology, hire staff locally, build commercial trial plans, and 6 of those actually ended up launching into the market conducting commercial trials or deploying their services commercially in Vietnam today. So that’s a bit of the wheel greasing that we like to talk about.

Drew Radford:

It certainly sounds like you’ve got a bit going on in Asia, to say the least. What about in Australia?

Justin Ahmed:

So just to give you a little shot of something closer to home, with support of the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries and the Future Drought Fund, we’ve just launched a Drought Venture Studio that we are deploying nationwide in partnership with the 8 drought and innovation hubs across Australia to help to surface and deploy new technologies and businesses focused on solving the challenge of drought in Australia’s agricultural environment. So we are going to be working with RDCs [rural research and development corporations], the drought hubs and several other providers of technology, corporate agribusinesses to support the commercialisation of meaningful research and IP [intellectual property] in Australian context.

Drew Radford:

Justin, what key trends and innovations do you see currently shaping the future of AgTech, and how’s Beanstalk adapting to support these?

Justin Ahmed:

I think one that’s probably not new to your listeners, but is increasingly across the minds of many of our clients and the innovators that we work with as well, is around ESG [environmental, social and governance] and sustainability.

Of course, this is not truly new, but I think we’re entering a new phase in this space. We’ve seen a lot of early failures and scrutiny around agricultural technology solutions, and around agribusinesses and investors' efforts to manage the sustainability in the agricultural landscape.

You might’ve seen a Guardian article not that long ago that the estimation, over 90% of carbon projects not actually delivering on what they’d be promising on. And as that journalistic and regulatory scrutiny progresses, there’s a big push for more robust and defensible solutions in the carbon space and elsewhere. What we see is that makes a lot of challenges and opportunities for more diverse use cases and infrastructure that will power a sustainability tech deck in the agricultural technology space.

I think another way that we are trying to shift, and it is tough for the innovation landscape in some space, it’s a recognition that digital tools and software just won't do it all. We really need to see more physical and biological solutions coming to market that are actually managing the physical flows of a lot of these biophysical constraints. Actually seeing real reduction and draw that stirs the drink.

And that's why in our Drought Venture Studio, we are not looking particularly at just promoting SaaS [software as a service] solutions and software-based solutions to a lot of these problems. We’re looking at leveraging the best of Australian technology and IP to wrap ventures around hard science and solutions.

Drew Radford:

So looking beyond our borders, how does Beanstalk view the global AgTech landscape and what opportunities do you see for Victorian AgTech startups to compete on a global scale?

Justin Ahmed:

I think maybe the main message that I’d love to get across to Australian AgTech providers is around the global landscape and how Beanstalk views it, is that it’s increasingly decentralised. We see this as an area where the pool of opportunity is really growing. There’s growing maturity of farmers, agribusinesses, intermediaries in all kinds of countries across the globe, including low and middle-income countries, and there’s a client base that’s hungrier and more pressured than ever, but increasingly smart and scrutinising with the inflow of solutions.

I’m from California. There’s kind of the first place that a lot of AgTech innovators leap from Australia to test their solutions and to build a market is California. But even though Australia is still a small pond and California is not the only big pond. Already, Indonesia’s agriculture sector is the 100 billion dollars industry that Australia is targeting to be in 2030, and India’s literally five times that.

So I think it’s important for AgTech providers to consider different paths to market, different destinations, and take that into account as they’re building their solutions and commercial strategies.

Drew Radford:

Justin, you ended up, from all your global travels, in Victoria. What advantages do you think AgTech startups have being based in Victoria?

Justin Ahmed:

It’s been such a great journey over the last three years getting to familiarise myself with the Australian, and more specifically the Victorian ecosystem, and I’ve been really impressed in a lot of ways in what Victoria provides. So I'll just call out 3.

The first is the ecosystem. There’s such a budding AgTech ecosystem landscape here in Victoria. So many public support programs. I know there’s been a suite of funding for pre-accelerators supporting the growth of over 400 new startups. They really have their hands full. And there’s such a depth of support from institutions that are really active in this space. So I think it’s important that startups take full advantage of that ecosystem and its support.

Second is just the research and development backbone from universities, TAFE, and in particularly how they’ve been collaborating locally with local agribusinesses. Over 30% of Australia’s food R&D is based in Victoria, and that’s a huge pool of opportunity for AgTech operators to leverage.

Maybe last, maybe most importantly is actually the accessibility and diversity of customers. So I think there are not that many actual startup hubs around the world where you can drive an hour and a half in any direction and be engaging with producers, as diverse that you see here in Victoria, whether broadacre dairy, horticulture grains, and red meats, and agribusinesses investors are here in huge numbers as well. So really important that AgTech operators leverage that, build their base and their network to the full extent there.

Drew Radford:

Lastly, what are your top 3 tips you°d offer startups seeking support and looking to thrive in overseas agricultural markets?

Justin Ahmed:

First, be targeted. Markets are not monoliths. Key decision-makers look and act differently across different markets, and so do different points of influence and impact. Do your diligence and make sure that you know the market that’s right for you.

Second, build a local network. Join WhatsApp, Facebook, email groups, and get folks knowing and looking out for you. Really encourage you to engage and get to know somebody locally who can rep your organisation in target market and help you to translate your top-of-funnel approach and materials to that market.

And thirdly, find financing that works for you. It’s been said a lot. The Silicon Valley model and the venture capital model doesn’t necessarily lend itself to AgTech, maybe even less so to those that are making a bold cross-border jump. We’re seeing all kinds of new pioneering models and really encourage folks to take advantage of non-dilutive capital and in-kind support, a lot like that is provided from public organisations here in Victoria, so we unlock a different pace of growth and nimbleness in your operation.

Drew Radford:

Justin Ahmed, Director at Beanstalk, thank you for taking the time and joining us for this AgTech Innovators podcast.

Justin Ahmed:

Thanks, Drew. Such a pleasure.

Speaker 1:

Thank you for listening to AgTech Innovators. For more episodes in this series, find us and follow us wherever you get your podcasts. We’d love to hear your feedback, so please leave a comment or rating and share this series with your friends and family.

All information is accurate at the time of release. Contact Agriculture Victoria or your consultant before making any changes on farm. This podcast was developed by Agriculture Victoria, authorised by the Victorian Government, Melbourne.