Supply Change Capital
Snapshot
Fund Type: Venture Fund
Fund Size: $40MM
Investment Stage: Pre-Seed and Seed
Geographic Focus: US-based, US-focused
Sector Focus: Food-Tech, Ag-Tech, Sustainable Food Systems
Fund Overview
Food supply chains are currently inefficient, wasteful, and environmentally detrimental - accounting (directly and indirectly) for up to 37% of GHG emissions. At the same time, multicultural citizens account for nearly all of US population growth, opening up new market opportunities and creating new economic power centres. Supply Change Capital is a first-of-its-kind fund that has identified a $10T opportunity at the intersection of the two forces radically transforming the food economy: climate and culture.
As the entire food system undergoes a fundamental shift, Supply Change’s debut $40MM fund is investing in ways to reduce emissions and waste throughout the food chain, from agriculture to distribution, and to create net positive impacts on soil, waterways and biodiversity. To unlock more resilient food systems, they have built systems to address bias in the investment process. As a result, their deal flow and portfolio mirrors US demographics, and reflects meaningful engagement with the communities that are most affected by the climate crisis: 56% of their portfolio companies are female-led and 70% are BIPOC led (as of Q3 2023).
Why We Invested
Investing in food and ag tech at the nexus of climate and culture, Supply Change Capital is paving the way for a new cohort of funds that leverage the important role that diversity plays in climate-related innovation. Their meaningful and deliberate intersectional investment lens centers diverse communities as drivers of inclusive, sustainable change and ensures no one is left behind in this new wave of food and ag innovation. We are honored to be able to work with this exceptional team to help them develop and incorporate an integrated gender lens into this exciting and unique thesis.
Women as Agents of Change
Currently, 100% of Supply Change’s portfolio companies have defined gender and diversity metrics, and the fund managers are also working closely with the portfolio to ensure inclusivity and opportunities for women in their workforces and supply chains.
One example is Compound, a San Francisco-based ingredient tech platform disrupting the climate-impacted coffee industry with its first beanless coffee product, Minus. In addition to being highly vulnerable to climate change, coffee supply chains tend to be highly extractive, negatively affecting workers and communities. Compound’s founder, Maricel Saenz, wanted to ensure that the transition to beanless coffee would not negatively impact the smallholder coffee farmers in her native Latin America, the majority of whom are now women.
Noramay Cadena and Shayna Harris, Managing Partners at Supply Change Capital, helped Maricel to create a partnership with a Nicaragua-based social enterprise that helps smallholder farmers diversify their production beyond coffee to high-value, more sustainable crops, such as spices that are grown in agroforestry systems. In doing so, they are helping to secure the financial positions of the women in these communities, and are equipping them to transition to a more resilient food system.
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