Farmdrop has closed a £3m funding round led by Atomico, the investment company founded by Skype co-founder Niklas Zennström.
The London-based business, set up by ex-Morgan Stanley stockbroker Ben Pugh to bridge the gap between buyers and producers, was launched in 2014 following a £750,000 investment on crowd-funding platform CrowdCube.
Ben Pugh, founder of Farmdrop, commented on the raise: “The food industry in this country is completely broken with too much power belonging to a selected few who treat farmers and producers badly, whilst offering consumers chemically-preserved, tasteless food.
“Farmdrop is on mission to fix the food chain by making it easy to buy the best food from the best local producers. We believe everyone deserves a more delicious world and this investment will help us continue to improve the product and spread the word about the Farmdrop revolution,” he continued.
Farmdrop uses “click-to-harvest” technology to allow consumers to purchase fresh food directly from local farms, whilst allowing producers to manage their supply better and decrease food waste.
Zennström, founding partner and CEO of Atomico, said Farmdrop was showing “huge ambition” by disrupting the established food chain and addressing the growing concerns that many consumers have about the quality and provenance of their food.
He added: “We’ve been extremely impressed with the team and their growth so far so we’re proud to become an investor. We’re especially pleased to be joining their existing bench of founder-funders, and look forward to providing our own unique value to Ben and his team as they begin to scale the business.”
JamJAr Investments, Jonathan Goodwin, Jason Goodman and previous angel investors Alex Chesterman and Quentin Griffiths also participated in the round.