← Investment Climate Podcast
Investment Climate Podcast
On $50M DeepTech Thesis & why Southern EU is the ultimate VC testing ground-José, Eatable AdventureS
00:32:34
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- [00:00]
A
We work with more than 80 food corporations. That means that we can basically bring them and call them. We can reach out to them and ask very clearly, is this a real problem you have? Is this a real solution? Is there a fit here or not? And then through our acceleration programs that we get a strong collaboration with both the researchers and the corporations, we can de risk the company in a significant way. So we are not scared of being the first ticket. Good. So thanks for having me, Alex. It's a great pleasure to be here today and also to chat with you. I think that you are very active in the ecosystem and it's always catch up and see how things are moving. So a little bit about me. I spent over 25 years working in the intersection of emerging technologies and industry transformation. Mostly in the telecommunications space, working for large multinational technology companies and participated in the early days of Internet and later in the application of those innovations into multiple sectors. Back in 2016, I co founded Eatable Adventures with Mila Balcarcel. That is a platform that is composed of several layers. One is acceleration, the other one is an innovation partnership for food corporations and also a venture capital arm that we articulated through Accelera Ventures. So in summary, we activated the strategy, capital and execution across the food system to turn new amazing innovations into real world impact.
- [01:43]
B
Okay, amazing. Well, you have an incredible education, you've built so much around different emerging industries and then you decided to go into food. So we're, we're very grateful to have a stars be part of the community. I've been actually a huge fan of yours. I followed a lot of development in my previous company, California Cultured. I think we were actually involved in one of your accelerators as well. So it's quite exciting to be speaking with you. Can you just give us a sense of what are you guys doing today? And this is being recorded April 17, Friday 2026. AI has still not taken over entirely the world. So we're not in a single area just yet. So if you're listening to this, we're still alive and kicking. So what is as of today, the programs and the services you provide to the ecosystem?
- [02:26]
A
Well, we have three layers. As I mentioned, the investment part is managed through Accelera, a venture funds manager particularly dedicated to agrifood. What we think is a major advantage, the focus of the verticality is helping startups and LPs a lot. The other part is Eatable Adventures. We are basically running a number of acceleration programs. Last year we did 12 programs, both internal, for our own investment needs. As well, as for third parties, we work with more than 80 food corporations helping them to find out innovation through specific challenges and open innovation programs that seek to identify the best companies for them. The way that we work is through call for programs in most of these activities. So you will see a lot of activity in networks from our side announcing programs, announcing new activities, and that is the way that we interact with entrepreneurs. And this is the way to start working in the, in the eatable adventures ecosystem.
- [03:33]
B
Amazing. So let's actually break down each one of those. Just open up each one of these little delicious boxes of chocolate here. So the fund, first of all, very direct question, is the fund still deploying cash?
- [03:46]
A
Yes, we did the first closing in July 23rd. Our final term for new investments is ending at the end of the year December 26th. We will continue deploying capital in the previous investments, but we are still looking for opportunities right now in the process of incorporating. My expectation is that this year we will be incorporating 12 new companies to the portfolio and we will be finishing the portfolio with 40 companies.
- [04:17]
B
Okay, check size, stage, geography, mission. Just take us through. If I'm listening to this podcast right now and Jose is saying, hey, this is who I want to talk to. What stage should I be in? Which way should I be based? What should I be as a founder? For me to even consider this being even relevant for the investment side of
- [04:38]
A
the value chain in terms of geography, that is for me the initial part. Most of our investors are in the southern European, Spanish and Latin American territories. So we deploy capital basically in this territory. One of our programs, raices, is dedicated to Spanish speaking founders. So we haven't invested, but we had been in conversations with Spanish founders in the us, Asia and other territories. Eventually we may be entering into one of these companies. In terms of check size, we're early stage, proceed seed stages. Primarily our goal is to get between 5 and 10% ownership of the company. We don't want more than 10% of the company. And that is basically the main decision factor when allocating a ticket for the company and also allocating the enterprise valuation for the company. We are normally between 100k and 300k tickets and that means that we work with companies that are in between 1 million enterprise value and 3 million enterprise value. In some locations we go up to 5 million, but that is very rare.
- [05:44]
B
And we talk about pre revenue, post revenue, pre reg, post reg, pre revenue.
- [05:50]
A
We were very early stage. We like to work when the technology is defined. We can validate that it's working. It's solving a real market need, it's solving a real problem. And in that context, we basically had the mechanisms to reduce risk in several aspects. So in technology, technology, we work with a large number of universities and research institutions that help us understand whether the technology is solid, is grounded, is replicable, is something that we can put in practice. On one side, as I mentioned before, we work with more than 80 food corporations. That means that we can basically bring them and call them. Actually these days it's more WhatsApp than. But we can reach out to them and ask very clearly, is this a real problem you have? Is this a real solution? Is there a fit here or not? And then through our acceleration programs that we get a strong collaboration with both the researchers and the corporations, we can de risk the company in a significant way. So we are not scared of being the first ticket. We are normally the first ticket. We actually prefer that stage. And that means that we enter in some cases when there are just a couple founders and the company is in many cases still at university level or leaving the university. And that is the sweet spot for us. Great.
- [07:22]
B
And then for you guys, would you
- [07:23]
A
lead or you only follow in the initial ticket? We lead because in many cases there's no other investor.
- [07:30]
B
So we need to.
- [07:32]
A
It depends on the territory. In some countries, like for example, Spain and Italy, you cannot really use SAFE in the American way. The American standard safe is not legally binding or legally valid, to put it in that way. So we cannot really use them. When we invest in companies in Delaware, for example, we have been investing in three of those last year, we use a normal safe. For us, it's the preferred method. We think it's amazing. It's super fast. In a week you can deploy capital and that is perfect.
- [08:05]
B
Okay, that's great. And I think for our listeners, they need to know sometimes, you know, what kind of limitations they have when they're reaching out because, you know, it doesn't make sense to reach out to you guys after they already secure a lead. Or is it okay to reach out though? So that, that's, that's perfect. Take us through some of the signals. I mean, you've been in the game for a while. You're. I mean, anyone who's been in the game from 2017, 2016, we'll talk about like, you know, it's basically you and the Burger Brothers out of Israel. It's kind of the, you know, the two guys, the two OGs. You know, I think Andrew maybe with us in the game at this point, but it's like you guys are, you've seen a lot of frogs, you've seen the good times, you've seen, you know, other times. So two questions that come to mind is first of all, has the thesis changed? Actually, if you were raising cash today for a fund, right? And I'm guessing you probably are, has this thesis change of what you're looking for today rather than what you were looking for in say 22 or 21 or 23?
- [08:57]
A
Well, the thesis has not changed so much for us. One of the biggest benefits of working very deeply with corporations is that you really get to know the problems they have. That is helping us focus in a big way. So we have very limited exposure to the alternative protein space. We didn't enter in the cellular at all because we realized the technical complexities that the technology has and still and will have for a long period of time. We also were very lucky to understand the real needs food corporations have and the problems they look to resolve, the technologies that will be valid to fulfill those needs. So our thesis is based on the tech. So we only invest in the tech. We are strong in Biotech. More than 50% of our investments has been down in the biotech space. And then we are very strong in artificial intelligence as well. We have been investing in artificial intelligence since 2018 with our previous investments from our own balance sheet. And a large part of the portfolio is now AI based, something like 70%. So it's a meaningful number. We like the convergence. We like startups that bring AI plus physics or like hype sound or they bring advanced robotics and automation with AI Nebula Farms, for example, photonics with blockchain and artificial intelligence like Aflabox. So we really like the blend of technologies and the convergence. And those are the companies that are performing better in the market. So we, we actually look for this profile of company that has an implication. The implication is that the founding team should be also scaled into, into multiple disciplines and should be wide enough to cover this in a, in a proper way. But that is the, the focus that we have right now in terms of investment thesis and that needs to be applied to a real problem. So I always say that.
- [10:58]
B
One second for our founders, this is, I love Jose's, he's very clear about where the trends are and what he's looking for. And I would just say I've seen this, we've gone through these, I would say three waves of where we were food tech, then we became climate tech. And I think, well, the companies now were called physical AI, right? So that's why I love how all the robotics companies that were deploying things or vertical farms, again you're putting a wrapper on something, it's like, wow, I'm doing physical AI. It's like, I think you're, yeah, we, like five years ago you would have been called food tech or agri food tech. And now, you know, years ago it was about the climate, now it's about all about physical AI to the founders. You know, it's okay, it's a rapper again. It's a beautiful thing. What Jose is saying is you better prove your chops on why you're the right founder to actually do let's say, let's call a physical AI solution how you multidisciplinary. And if you're in deep tech, like what specifically you have unique knowledge in executing with this technology. So Azeyba, please go ahead.
- [11:58]
A
Yeah, so I was saying that this needs to be grounded with solutions for real problems. So we need to get a clear understanding of how those amazing technologies are actually solving a real problem in the food space. And that is basically the way we work that take us to a matrix. So the segments plus the technologies create a matrix and that is how we map opportunities. Being vertical also gives you a strong feeling of where the market is developing, where the market is not developing and you can find where the space is and so on. So those are the mechanisms that we follow when we make decisions for investment.
- [12:37]
B
So if I'm hearing some of the signals you're looking at, okay, education, a pretty, pretty key one at this point, right? Probably again, if there's a strong IP or something spinning out of the university that's protected any other signals that you would say, hey, this is a good fit. And obviously it sounds like you, you know, Southern Europe and speaking Spanish speaking countries. So if you're, if you're at the moment in India, probably not the right time to call Jose. Go call Omnivore Capital, don't call Jose. Why are you talking to me? Anybody else that. Well, actually, you know, not to push back. But it's interesting when I was at, when I was at California, we didn't accelerate through you guys, right? And California culture did not have any speak Spanish speaking. I don't think Alan speaks Spanish. Maybe I'm wrong. And also they didn't, you know, we were United States companies. So how did that fit in?
- [13:27]
A
Well, that was part of a program called Milkubator that that is, I think it's quite an amazing vehicle for the industry. So this is a program we did in conjunction with Pasquale, that is one of the leading dairy providers in, in the country. And the, the management and the ownership a few years ago had this visionary approach to the market. Like, okay, we are okay now. We are doing well. We are incorporating innovations in a continuous way. But we want to be prepared for the future. We want to understand how the future is going to be shaped. And also this family, they have a strong sense of helping the community. So they wanted to help entrepreneurs come to the dairy market and the dairy space. So together we created Milcubator, that is basically a dairy incubator. We were looking for deep tech applied to the segment that is, I think the program is in the fourth edition now. And that is where California was one of the companies that was selected.
- [14:30]
B
And that was a global. Basically call it. Okay, got it. So that's one accelerator slide. Maybe we'll get a chance to come back to it.
- [14:38]
A
But.
- [14:39]
B
And it was a great program. Question to you going back to signals of the fund itself, right? What signals? Additional signals should founders be thinking about that would make you say, hey, that's a hell yes for us to come in right now.
- [14:53]
A
I think one of them is understanding the problem in a deep way. So getting super deep into the problem and all the potential solutions and nuances that are associated, that is a big one. Execution for us and especially for me is super, super important. So velocity is what differentiates one company that is successful from one company that will not make it. And then resilience and adaptability. One thing that you see when you work with companies in the very earliest st stage is how they evolve, how they change every year. It's quite amazing. So you see idealistic approach to a solution to the market. Very rough ideas that needs to be worked out, documented, et cetera, et cetera. Companies three years after that phase is completely different. And the problems the CEO is suffering are completely different. And it's a different animal. So this is something that we explained to founders in our acceleration program is how the company is going to be evolved, how their role as a CEO needs to be evolving as well. And that implies people that needs to be comfortable with change, they need to be comfortable with uncertainty, and they need to do this in an environment that is fast moving and fast paced. Those are the three elements we'll jump
- [16:13]
B
in all the time. But the way I see it, as a father, I have three kids. My youngest now is like, my gosh, my Youngest kids are 10, almost 10. My oldest is almost 15. My first kid was 23, 23, 24, something like crazy. Wow. Happy anniversary to my wife. Sometimes 15 years already. What I see is almost like startups aren't like newborns. Right? So the evolution of a newborn is very different from someone who's 97. You know, obviously you're evolving as a 97 year old for sure, but your growth pattern is going to look different as a 97 year old than a child. Like I want the rate of development for my 2 months old to breed pretty. Like I expect him to change by the time he's two. Like if he hasn't, that's a concern. But if I'm seeing radical change from something 97 to 99, you're just a creepy old human being. You should probably just keep going where you're going to make changes at 99. That's what's going on there. So I see it also the same way I see startups. The evolution should be similar to a young newborn. That's part of the process. But if you mature, radical evolution is maybe sometimes quite dangerous. Do you like that analogy or you see a little different?
- [17:22]
A
Yeah, I think is very accurate. I think that the teenager face is also there as well. That you are not, you are not in one side and you are not in the other. And that is for us the moment,
- [17:34]
B
the valley of death, I think.
- [17:36]
A
Yeah, yeah, for us. For us the moment where a company is starting to be all is grown up, it's starting to be more mature and so on is the moment to start thinking about exiting. So our role is the creation of companies and the attraction of innovation to this market space. So when the company is shape out, is created, it's growing, it has 30 employees and is more solid. Is a moment where we are not providing so much value as an investor. Is the moment where we can, in conjunction with the CEO, we start thinking, okay guys, next round if there is possibility, we would like to start getting out. And actually we continue supporting the companies even when we leave them because we want to provide value to the ecosystem. So we are super happy to continue in helping us in a way or
- [18:26]
B
form that we can take us through. Now the behaviors, because you mentioned three elements which I think are really critical elements of the signals that we're talking about. Can you take us through what actions are you actually looking at? Because one can say resilience, but resilience is actually just a combination of actions. So take us more from the general language of the resilience, the change, evolution and actually how do you see that in the startup and what signals are you looking for in behavior? Because a deep tech company, you know, often they're not going to be able to have customer reviews. They can't just put a CPG product out there and have people talk about it from an experienced language. What is the measure of action that you're looking at that says these people are actually fast moving and they are actually into evolution, they're self reflective. I speak with founders raising every day and they're all telling me the same thing. It's harder than ever to find investors who are actually deploying. And getting access to those leads takes time. Founders just don't have. Every month fundraising is a month burning Runway. This is why we created FTW Plus, a community of founders actively fundraising, the world's most accurate agri food tech investor database. Plus connecting you directly to ideal target investors and a community of support and accountability, guaranteed results or your money back. Apply today at www.joinftw.com hub.
- [20:03]
A
Well, when you work with a large number of founders, we have 39 companies in portfolio right now. So you average two or three founders per company. That is over 100. We meet all of them and we meet every quarter with all of them. And we are very disciplined. We have a strong discipline on meeting and following and chasing. So many of them. When you challenge them about what they do, the way that they are evolving the product or the technology and so on, the reaction is something that is normally very, very interesting. In many cases they are very proactive and they challenge you as well. And they come back and we have further interactions about why or why not and what is this other competitor doing and why you are not doing it or why you should be doing and so on. So that profile where they are open to discuss at a technical level, that is a big signal that they worry about the product and they have a strong willingness to fulfill a mission in terms of execution. Similarly, and this is something that I said to many, many founders, when they are fundraising and they are approaching potential investors and so on, the number of investors they approach is are you talking to three venture capitalists or are you talking to 300 venture capitalists? So that gives you indication of how they see the evolution of the company, how much they want to put into the future of this venture and so on. And this is a question I make also to the new startups. How many people are just talking about how many people you have presented this product and so on because obviously you can be in love with what you do, but you need to get it completely validated. By the industry, by the investors and the academia. So that is in terms of execution, that is the way that we measure the performance and the signals. Resilience is more associated with the multiple problems that you face when you are creating a company. And in these years, the list of issues that we have seen in startups is huge. Sometimes a founder calls you with a very, very big problem and they say, well, I don't know, it's hard to explain. And basically we already have three of in the past. So you are basically understanding very well what's going on and understanding what is the resolution. And you have a number of options that work or didn't work, but you can put a number of alternatives on the table in this space. For us, the footprint that we are working in is also very important because there is a super strong cultural fit. So obviously Spain and Latin America, not only the language, but we share a, a common culture. So we, we understand what's going on and we understand the founders and so on. What will be difficult in, in other territories. Italy, similarly, the culture is very similar. So we, we, we can have very open, very direct conversations. And for us this is like working in a virtual country that is helping us to, to get a strong link with all the ecosystem members.
- [23:10]
B
Amazing, amazing. And, and, and having that culture within the culture is, is a really powerful bonding as well. I feel like whenever I've spoken to Italian founders or Spanish founders, there's a lot of directness as well there, which I appreciate. You get to the freaking point fast, which is anybody who spent a lot of time with me, I go fast. My style is fast. Some people like slow, which is, both are legitimate. There's not, there's, there's zero saying that one style is better than other in my opinion. Uh, but I go fast. So I appreciate that culture very, very much. Last two questions that I think our, our listeners, it's important for them to, to get a sense from you. At what point should I be reaching out to you and what is going to look like? Right. So I listened to this podcast. I think, gosh, you know, I think I'm actually the right fit for you. What should happen next? Right? What's going to happen next? What is the time to make a decision? For example, if I have, you know, is it a two months process? Is a, is a, it's a five months due diligence process. What should I expect if I'm reaching out to you?
- [24:07]
A
So we work on program basis, so that means that we issue call for projects and the call for project for us is more like a marketing event, like a public communication activity and so on. But we are always talking to founders and receiving texts from founders and so on. When we get a new call, we want to know whether 5, 10, 15 companies will be applying and we can work with them and so on. So the formal process starts with the call for projects and applying to the call for projects. But they can reach out at any moment either by LinkedIn or email and so on. Any startup can send an email to startupsowelladventures.com and there's a. A team that is taking care of that and that is the formal part in terms of decision. Once we get the call for project finished and we start doing the evaluations, etc. We are pretty fast. So we make a decision in four weeks. In four weeks we move to term sheets. Term sheets are very standardized these days, so normally in a couple months after the program finishes, we normally have term sheets. So.
- [25:19]
B
And Jose, anything we should know? It's obviously a public on the website, but anything we should know about the programs? Open calls you're running this year that founders should just be aware of or obviously they'll direct it to the website. But anything that you want to talk about, which programs are up and running or you're thinking about launching this year, there's so founders can get their thoughts around it.
- [25:37]
A
So we are right now in the investment phase for Foodseed 26 in Italy. So we launched the call for projects in November. We have already selected eight companies. Quite amazing. And we are in the final stages of closing the investment part with them. We will be launching braces that is mainly for Spanish speaking founders in a couple of weeks. So the team is already starting to do scouting and conducting startups and so on. And the formal call for projects will be launched in two weeks. At the end of the month we will be launching again Food Rice in the summer timeframe. Food Rice is ending right now, the last year program is ending next week and we are doing a Food Security Week event in Buenos Aires. So Food Rice is specifically for South Korean and Latin American startups and it's a program that we're doing in conjunction with IDB International Development Banking in Washington. So those are the programs that are running right now. Now we are also operating third party programs. So we expect that we will be launching, traditionally launch every quarter incubation or acceleration program in Madrid for the Innovation Hub. And then we have been running Cajamard, that is also in a call for projects at the moment through The Cajamar foundation website. So we normally have one or two programs going on at the, at the same time.
- [27:05]
B
You got a whole menu of opportunities that people are, they're willing to participate. Look, I think it's been extremely valuable conversation. The last question, actually last two questions that kind of come to mind. One is you've been in software, you've been telecom. Like these are massive industries. One big. From an investment standpoint, are you bullish? Like where are we going? As a fund manager, would you go out and raise another fund today? Or is this so if you are, one would say, my God, that's crazy. You're going to raise a fund in a sector that's burned through $5 billion. Why is this going to happen? So can you just, if you may just. Why are you bullish? And who's going to give you money to do this?
- [27:45]
A
So we, we are starting the fundraising process for our second fund that is going to be a 50 million fund. Hopefully. We, we would like to have it closed during the year. It's a very harsh climate for, for fundraising, but the performance that our startups are having is quite amazing. So compared to the international benchmarks we are in terms of return, we are, we are something like, like 25, 30% better than the percentile, 75%. The reason is because we enter very early, the companies start growing very fast and obviously that produce a strong return for our investors. So the story that we can tell to investors is very good. We are also an impact vehicle. So a hundred percent of what we do is impact. So we are officially Article 8. But 100% of the investment we do needs to have ESG thesis and needs to be part of our ESG thesis. So an impact vehicle that can produce nice returns above market performance we hope should have potential investors. So we are working on that. Any potential investor interested, we are super welcome to explain what we do in detail. And I think also is there a
- [28:58]
B
minimum check for that 500. Okay, good. Okay.
- [29:03]
A
And I also think that there is a lack of early stage vehicles in this market and the food market needs innovation to accommodate to the climate change and all the restrictions that is imposing in production. So we think that emerging innovation is needed in this market and we also think that it makes sense to create vehicles that continue supporting new startups and growing the market.
- [29:30]
B
And my assumption, tell me if I'm correct, is I think one of the reasons why you're successful is because you're so close to the industry. A lot of the bigger generalist funds, they came With a mentality that their benefit was that they're outside the industry. Right. That's they come and disrupt. You know, if somebody was in a cab industry, they probably want to bet on Uber. Right. So it's very hard to disrupt yourself. But one thing I think we've learned is that the food industry is very monopolistic. Right. And then in terms of there's a high heavy control and actually heavy efficiency in the food industry, extreme efficiencies. So the fact that you have corporate partners that have a sense of what needed is like that's a differentiated plus you focus on markets, didn't have crazy valuations like Latam compared to the United States and maybe Western Europe. Right. So you were able to come in and still on a half a billion dollar exit you could do very well. While somebody in the United States would never do well on the half a billion dollar exit.
- [30:22]
A
I agree.
- [30:24]
B
Or am I off?
- [30:25]
A
No, no, you are completely right. The other angle is the quality of education in this territory. So Italy has a strong research institutions. Universities are very, very, very good. Buenos Aires, sorry. Argentina is extremely good in biotech. So we are finding amazing scientists in the region. Low wages, low cost of living and so on what makes a very good scenario for startup development. So I think that we have assets that we can put on the table to, to bring new, new, amazing innovation to this market.
- [31:01]
B
Amazing, Amazing. Well, I tell you that I fell in love with Argentina. I haven't been yet, but I fell in love after I read four Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss and he talks about going to learn tango dancing and Buenos Aires. Yeah, I think there's another reason for you to go. Jose, thank you for this conversation. I think all of our listeners have learned a lot and they'll be in touch.
- [31:19]
A
Perfect. Very good. Great to speak to you.
- [31:21]
B
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