Investments in AgriFoodTech kept declining in the third quarter of 2025. This is not specific to the AgriFood ecosystem: startup funding is declining in all categories except artificial intelligence (AI). As shown on the graph below, not all regions are affected similarly: FoodTech startups in North America are doing relatively better. Their funding bounced back in 2024 and kept rising in the first three quarters of 2025.

As for the topics covered in this third watch, among all the elements spotted, here are the top insights that caught our attention:

• The biomass fermentation ecosystem is “getting cleaned”: many startups have recently failed, making the ecosystem much more easy to “read” with one or two clear leader per sub-category.
• Still numerous bankruptcies and cashless acquisitions
• Two alternative proteins categories are doing well:
  • Egg alternatives (Revyve, Polopo, Meala…) with multiple fundings and news
  • Oil and fat alternatives (also, many announcements).
• Significant corporate involvement in cocoa alternatives
• Significant uptick in the activity in the natural ingredients / botanicals

Watch: categorisation by product type

Alternative proteins (meat, dairy, coffee, cocoa)

Taste enhancers (sugar, fat & beyond)

Optimising-scaling technologies & AI

Regulatory updates & government support

Consumer insights Q3 2025

Natural ingredients

Health-driven innovations

Investments & state of the ecosystem

Top news from all the different categories

Categorisation by technology

Tags used to categorise some of the watch items by technology rather than product type

Precision fermentation

Biomass fermentation

Plant-based

Cellular agriculture

Molecular farming

Upcycling

Artificial Intelligence