Taylor Wessing advised MULTIVAC on its investment in BayWa Venture GmbH and the establishment of an AgriFoodTech venture alliance between BayWa, Bindewald and Gutting Mühlengruppe and MULTIVAC

Taylor Wessing, led by Munich partner Dr Philip Cavaillès, has advised the MULTIVAC Group ("MULTIVAC"), market leader for food processing and packaging solutions, on its investment in BayWa Venture GmbH and the establishment of an AgriFoodTech venture alliance between BayWa, Bindewald and Gutting Mühlengruppe and MULTIVAC.

BayWa Venture GmbH, the leading processing and packaging machine expert MULTIVAC and the Bindewald and Gutting Mühlengruppe are jointly investing around 20 million euros in AgriFoodTech start-ups.

The mission of the newly renamed AgriFoodTech Venture GmbH is to promote innovative solutions for sustainable food production.

The alliance is based on the existing activities of BayWa Venture GmbH, a subsidiary of BayWa AG. As the investment arm of BayWa AG, it has invested in twelve promising AgriFoodTech start-ups over the past three years, which contribute to making the value chain in the food sector more sustainable. Germany's largest family-run milling group, Bindewald and Gutting, as well as MULTIVAC, will in future participate in this investment as shareholders. As part of a capital increase of just under 10 million euros, they will take an equal stake in BayWa Venture GmbH, which will be renamed in AgriFoodTech Venture GmbH. BayWa remains the majority shareholder with 51 per cent. 

The existing BayWa Venture start-up portfolio with twelve growth companies from Europe, Israel and the USA will be brought into the alliance and is to be expanded to around 20 start-ups with the help of the joint investment sum. The new alliance will focus on financing start-ups that use new technologies to make food production and packaging more economical and sustainable in the future.

The investment focus of the AgriFoodTech Venture Alliance will include the following areas:

• AgTech / BioTech: Innovations to make food production more efficient and sustainable.
• FoodTech: New applications of plant proteins in human nutrition as well as healthy nutrition and food safety
• Circular Economy: Upcycling of side streams and reduction of food waste as well as biodegradable and recyclable materials
• Automation & Digitalisation: Creating transparency within the agri-food supply chain, automation through robotics and AI as well as predictive analytics & maintenance Cooperation, investment and impact rethought together

The transaction is still subject to approval by the relevant competition authorities.

 
Legal advisers of MULTIVAC:
Taylor Wessing: Dr Philip Cavaillès (Lead, Partner), Dr Daniel Schrembs, LL.M. (Salary Partner), Fritz Krings (Associate), Inken Brandt, LL.M. (Associate), Johannes Philipp Tapken, LL.B. (Associate), all Corporate/M&A, all Munich; Dr. Michael Beer (Salary Partner, Employment, Munich); Dr Stefan Horn (Salary Partner, Competition/Antitrust, Hamburg), Martin Eckel (Partner), Verena Stagl (Counsel), Olena Stakhurska (Partner), all Competition/Antitrust, all Vienna.