✨ Kicking Off the Year by Connecting Innovation, Investment, and Ecosystem in Uruguay
We kicked off the year in Punta del Este by taking part in three key ecosystem gatherings — #PuntaTech, #WeInvest, and a Demo Day at Draper House Americas — alongside the regional investment community, with the collaboration of ARCAP and URUCAP
It was an intense few days filled with high-quality conversations, new connections, and valuable exchanges with entrepreneurs, investors, and ecosystem leaders from across the region. 🚀
At Draper House, the Demo Day showcased the teams’ hands-on work: focused sessions, hypothesis validation, and strategic decision-making to strengthen their business models. The jury included Beatriz Ponce de León, Partner & CFO at GLOCAL, who brought a strong investment and financial perspective to the discussions.
Separately, as part of #WeInvest, Beatriz — in her role as a We Invest Ambassador — took part in an exclusive networking breakfast, contributing her perspective on ecosystem development and the role of capital in creating real opportunities.
At GLOCAL, we deeply value these spaces where collaboration flows and tangible opportunities emerge. We return energized and motivated to keep building impact throughout 2026. 🌎
✨ Kicking Off the Year by Connecting Innovation, Investment, and Ecosystem in Uruguay
We kicked off the year in Punta del Este by participating in three key ecosystem gatherings: ARCAP / URUCAP, WeInvest, and Draper House Americas.
Across these events, we connected with founders, investors, and ecosystem leaders, exchanging ideas on how to keep strengthening innovation and venture capital in the region.
At WeInvest, Beatriz participated as Uruguay Ambassador in a breakfast designed to connect women who are leading and transforming the investment and technology ecosystem—an inspiring space for dialogue, shared experiences, and meaningful connections across the region.
We wrapped up the week at Draper House Americas, where Beatriz joined the Demo Day jury, contributing to conversations around strategy, execution, and company-building alongside founders and ecosystem peers.
At GLOCAL, we deeply value these spaces where collaboration fuels real progress—and we head into 2026 energized to keep building impact.
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Nature – Positive Technology: Why Climatech and Agrifoodtech are Central to the Next Growth Cycle
Nature is becoming a hard constraint on growth. As AI and digital infrastructure scale, resources such as water, land, energy and biodiversity are emerging as limiting factors for the economy. While over 50% of global GDP depends on nature, most companies still focus mainly on carbon. For ClimateTech and AgriFoodTech, this is a structural shift: agriculture sits at the center of both the problem and the solution. Technologies that enable efficiency, resilience and measurable impact are becoming essential infrastructure.
This directly reinforces GLOCAL’s Clean AgriFoodTech Playbook: adoption-first solutions embedded in real workflows, capital-efficient paths to scale, and measurable outcomes across water, soil and biodiversity. Nature-positive alignment is no longer an ESG add-on — it is becoming a core investment filter and a core driver of scalable value creation.
AgriFoodTech Venture Capital: 2025 Reset and 2026 Outlook
Key Takeaways
- 2025 marked a structural reset for AgriFoodTech VC, defined by capital discipline, selective deployment, and operational accountability.
- Latin America mirrored, and in some cases accelerated, his recalibration, favoring technologies embedded in real agricultural value chains with clear ROI.
- 2026 is shaping up as a year of selective growth, driven by applied intelligence, automation, biologicals, and digital infrastructure rather than speculative expansion.
2025: Discipline Over Expansion
Globally, approximately USD 6.1 billion was invested across ~700 AgriFoodTech startups in 2025. While total capital deployed showed modest growth, deal volume declined, reflecting a clear concentration of capital into fewer, higher-quality companies.
Investor focus shifted decisively away from growth-at-all-costs toward unit economics, adoption, and execution. Valuations normalized, and companies unable to demonstrate tangible value creation faced down-rounds, consolidation, or shutdowns. Conversely, disciplined operators strengthened governance, operational positioning, and exit optionality.
M&A emerged as the primary liquidity pathway, with strategic buyers across agriculture, food, inputs, machinery, biotech, and data prioritizing validated capabilities over experimental technologies.
Latin America: Selective Recovery, Stronger Foundations
Following a sharp contraction in 2024, Latin America did not experience a speculative rebound in 2025. Instead, the region operated under continued selectivity, reinforcing capital discipline.
Investment concentrated in companies demonstrating:
- Proven commercial traction and operational deployment
- Clear productivity gains or cost efficiencies for producers
- Alignment with sustainability, traceability, and compliance requirements
Across the ecosystem, 2025 was widely described as a shift toward “less euphoria, more foundation”, with stronger governance, improved capital efficiency, and more realistic growth trajectories. Brazil remained the anchor market, particularly across biological inputs, digital agriculture, automation, and agrifintech infrastructure.
2026 Outlook: Selective Growth and Adoption at Scale
Looking ahead, 2026 is expected to consolidate the discipline established in 2025. Capital deployment will remain selective, prioritizing technologies that deliver:
- Verified productivity gains
- Margin expansion and risk reduction
- Regulatory and sustainability compliance
In Latin America, the opportunity in 2026 sits at the intersection of expanding agribusiness financing and accelerating technology adoption. Broader access to rural credit, structured debt, and capital markets instruments is strengthening agribusiness value chains and enabling more capital-efficient scaling for technology providers embedded within them.
Potential progress in the EU–Mercosur framework would further enhance this opportunity by accelerating demand for traceability, sustainability, and regulatory-grade reporting across export-oriented supply chains. Importantly, this represents upside optionality rather than a dependency, the core adoption drivers remain structural.
High-Conviction Themes for 2026
The strongest opportunities for 2026 build on segments that proved resilient in 2025:
- Applied Intelligence & Digital Agronomy – AI and decision intelligence embedded in daily farm and supply-chain operations, focused on explainability and measurable ROI.
- Automation, & Precision Execution – Technologies improving execution reliability, reducing labor dependency, and enhancing input efficiency.
- AgBiotech, Biologicals & Regenerative Inputs – Microbial and biological solutions aligned with productivity, and soil health..
- Agrifintech, Platforms & Embedded Infrastructure – Embedded finance, marketplaces, and integrated platforms enabling capital-efficient scale across value chains.
- Sustainability, Traceability & Compliance Enablement – Technologies enabling auditable data, emissions measurement, and regulatory-grade reporting.
Bottom Line
AgriFoodTech is transitioning from experimentation to industrialization. In 2026, value creation will favor founders and investors capable of executing at scale, integrating into real agricultural value chains, and delivering measurable economic and environmental outcomes. Latin America stands out as a region where structural demand, operational complexity, and improving financial infrastructure converge to create durable, long-term opportunity.
📰 GLOCAL Highlighted in La Nación’s Guide to Argentina’s Venture Capital Ecosystem
GLOCAL was included in a La Nación feature showcasing leading venture capital and seed funds operating in Argentina and members of the local VC association, ARCAP. The guide highlights key information about each fund — investment focus, geographies, leadership teams, and portfolio companies — serving as a practical reference for entrepreneurs seeking funding.
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🚀 Startup applications for Kamay Code Río de Janeiro 2026 are now open!
If your startup is building innovative solutions in agtech, biotech, logistics, fintech, waste management, manufacturing, digital S&OP or commercialization at the point of sales, this is your chance to work hand in hand with leading corporations like Coca-Cola and Grupo Arcor, collaborating directly to co-create real solutions and design Proofs of Concept (PoCs) that can open doors to long-term business opportunities.
📍 March 18, 2026 | Museu do Amanhã, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
💡 Explore the five challenges and apply now at kamaycode.com
After five editions, Kamay Code has built a community where collaboration turns into real business outcomes, and it’s still expanding. Don’t miss the chance to be part of the next big edition.
@Kamay Ventures @Sofia Ocampo @John Newkirk
📰Industry Highlights
🔸BASF Acquires Bio-Control Specialist AgBiTech to Expand Biologicals Portfolio
BASF Agricultural Solutions announced the acquisition of AgBiTech, a Texas-based biological insect control company, taking full ownership of its assets, IP, manufacturing and R&D operations in a deal expected to close in the first half of 2026, strengthening BASF’s biological crop protection offerings — particularly for the Brazilian market — and complementing its existing BioSolutions portfolio with virus-based pest management technology.
🔸Brazil’s AgTech Market Enters 2026 with More Fundamentals and Less Hype
Brazil’s agtech investment market enters 2026 with greater maturity and lower investor euphoria after a selective recovery in 2025, when more than R$ 680 million was invested (around 10% less than in 2024), with capital increasingly focused on data, climate resilience, productivity and traceability solutions, and a clear shift toward disciplined, impact-driven growth rather than speculative expansion.
🔸EU–Mercosur Agreement: European Commission seeks to move forward despite delays
The European Parliament postponed the ratification of the EU–Mercosur agreement due to legal concerns, but the European Commission said it is ready to provisionally apply the deal if Mercosur countries ratify it and EU member states approve it, despite opposition from agricultural sectors and some European countries.
🔸Corteva and BP Launch Etlas, a New Global Biofuels Platform Led by an Argentine Executive
Corteva and energy major BP announced the launch of Etlas, a joint venture focused on producing agricultural oils — including canola, mustard, and sunflower — to supply sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) and renewable diesel markets. The new company will be led by Argentine executive Ignacio Conti and aims to scale renewable feedstocks to support the global transition toward lower-carbon fuels.
🔸 Brazilian Soy Traders Prepare to Exit the Soy Moratorium
Major soy traders in Brazil are preparing to abandon the Soy Moratorium after Mato Grosso approved a law cutting tax incentives for companies that adhere to the agreement, a move upheld by the Supreme Court, potentially weakening a key voluntary mechanism that has limited deforestation-linked soy since 2006.
🔸Proparco and IDB Invest Support CMI Alimentos’ Expansion in Central America
Proparco and IDB Invest provided USD 40 million in financing to CMI Alimentos to strengthen and expand its operations in El Salvador, Honduras and Costa Rica, supporting food security, job creation and sustainability improvements, including lower environmental impact and stronger local economic development.
🔸Microsoft Expands Its Bet on Regenerative Carbon Credits with Indigo Ag
Microsoft signed a 12-year agreement to purchase 2.85 million carbon credits generated through regenerative agriculture from Indigo Ag, a volume far higher than its previous purchases and aligned with its goal of becoming carbon negative by 2030, while providing farmers with financial incentives to adopt soil-carbon-sequestering practices.
🔸Solinftec Raises R$189 Million Through Green CRA to Boost 2026 Investments
Brazilian agtech Solinftec issued R$189 million in green Agribusiness Receivables Certificates (CRA), its fifth such issuance and higher than the R$150 million raised in 2023, with funds earmarked to finance AI-based equipment, software and robotics that enhance operational efficiency and reduce emissions in agriculture.
🔎 Featured AgriFoodTech rounds
🔸 ByBug launches fundraising campaign and reaches 41% of its goal with international backing
🔸 Barnwell Bio raises $6m to bring COVID-era bio-surveillance playbook to poultry barns
🔸 Brazilian logtech raises US$28 million and accelerates transportation financing in Brazil
🔸 Livestock health monitoring start-up Barnwell Bio closes $6m seed round
🔸 Hydrosat Raises $60 Million To Scale Thermal Satellite Data And AI Analytics
💼 Portfolio
The Mercury News Highlights Kilimo’s Role in Transforming Water Management in California. In an article addressing California’s structural water challenges, the publication underscores Kilimo’s contribution to measuring and optimizing agricultural water use. Through its work with strategic partners, Kilimo is positioned as a leading provider of technology-driven solutions that enable more efficient, traceable, and sustainable water management.
Done Properly is featured in El Mercurio’s Innovation Special, sharing its perspective on the future of biotechnology and the challenge of scaling innovation sustainably. Felipe Aldunate, COO of Done Properly, highlighted the importance of moving from lab-scale to industrial production while remaining cost-competitive and financially sustainable
Done Properly was selected among the world’s 500 most relevant FoodTech startups in the FoodTech 500 2025 ranking, curated by Forward Fooding. With more than 1,200 applications from 50 countries, this recognition highlights the company’s global impact and marks its return to the ranking following the internal changes initiated in 2024. The final ranking with official positions will be published in late March 2026.
ZoomAgri validates its AI technology for barley variety identification in collaboration with the Canadian Grain Commission, demonstrating that its computer vision–based solution achieves accuracy levels comparable to DNA-based methods. The evaluation, conducted on 71 samples across seven barley varieties, showed purity differences within a ±5% range, highlighting the technology as a faster and more cost-effective option for routine quality control in the malting and brewing industries.
