Friday 23rd June 2023, 10:00am
Rhizocore Technologies, a Roslin Innovation Centre-based company which produces special fungi to ensure trees survive and thrive, is poised to transform the future of reforestation after attracting new funding of £3.5 million.
Founded in 2021 by CEO Toby Parkes and Chief Mycologist David Satori, Rhizocore develops technologies to grow symbiotic fungi that enhance the growth, resilience, and carbon sequestration potential of newly planted forests and woodlands.
The start-up has now developed a first-of-its-kind fungal pellet, which acts as a vital underground nutrient exchange between trees and fungi known as the Wood-Wide Web.
This unique approach to restoring underground fungal networks offers a new and sustainable solution to accelerating woodland regeneration, improving forest productivity and increasing the potential for carbon capture.
The company has ambitious plans to scale its
operations over the next two and half years, with the aim of planting up
to 5 million trees with accompanying fungal pellets in 2025 alone. Their recent
seed-round funding, which was led by ReGen Ventures, New York-based VC firm Collaborative Fund and Grok Ventures, will allow Rhizocore to
build upon their 10 person team and develop the infrastructure needed to
rapidly scale their solutions. Rhizocore have now joined ReGen Ventures’ investment portfolio
of global regenerative technology companies that are supporting planetary scale
regeneration.
“We’re delighted to partner with Toby and David - what Rhizocore has built is incredibly powerful. We’re excited to support David, Toby and the team to build their networks of fungal diversity that can be deployed across the world”.
Dan Fitzgerald, Founder and Managing Partner, ReGen Ventures“Rhizocore’s mycorrhizal solutions are really exciting. Toby and David have pioneered a breakthrough approach that can accelerate reforestation while moving the needle for traditional forestry companies — both critical means to addressing a vast and unresolved issue in climate change.”
Guy Vidra, Partner at Collaborative FundLaunching at scale is now imperative to creating the necessary impact, and the £3.5 million backing behind Rhizocore is an investment in the fungal kingdom that has the potential to increase the restoration of biodiversity in ecosystems around the world. It’s a backing that Grok Ventures believes will be critical to scaling global nature-based carbon sequestration.
“Toby and David are the type of mission-driven founders we want to partner with at Grok and we are excited to join as investors in the most recent round. We love what Rhizocore do - harnessing the power of fungi to help their customers maintain natural capital ecosystems better, improving their bottom line and drawing down more carbon.”
Sam Tidswell, Principal, Grok Ventures“To receive such global backing really is a validation of our product’s potential to restore ecosystems around the world - but it’s also a recognition of the transformative power that fungi hold, as the crucial foundation of the planet’s ecosystems. This is a radical approach to tackle climate change that we’re developing at Rhizocore, and with the support from our investors, we will be able to sequester gigatons of carbon to protect the future of the Earth for generations to come.”
Dr Toby Parkes, CEO, Rhizocore Technologies LtdRoslin Innovation Centre
The University of Edinburgh
Easter Bush Campus
Midlothian EH25 9RG
