DURHAM, NC. — Elo Life Systems has raised $20.5 million in an oversubscribed Series A2 funding round. The funding round was led by DCVC Bio and Novo Holdings. Other investors included Hanwha Next Generation Opportunity Fund, AccelR8, and Alexandria Venture Investments. With this funding round, the company has raised $45 million to date, according to the company.
Elo Life Systems is an ingredient company for the food and beverage industry. Elo Life’s molecular farming platform produces ingredients that may be difficult to harvest from natural sources and cannot be synthesized through artificial or other techniques. The company produces easy-to-grow crops as bio factories for these ingredients, according to the company.
With the funding, Elo Life Systems said it will scale and commercialize its sweetener product, increase its molecular farming pipeline of healthy and sustainable ingredients, and expand its crop protection and productivity efforts.
“At Elo, we’re on a mission to unlock nature’s abilities to make consumers’ favorite foods more delicious, healthy and planet friendly,” said Todd Rands, chief executive officer at Elo. “With strong support from our investors, we’re well positioned to scale up our production and stay on track to launch our first product in 2026.”
The company’s first product of sweeteners is a monk fruit derived sweetener and will launch in 2026, according to the company. The sweetener may be used in food and beverage products to reduce sugar and artificial sweeteners. In addition to the monk fruit derived sweetener, the company said it is planning to look at producing other ingredients from novel proteins, natural preservatives, and high-value flavors and bio-actives.
“Molecular farming will allow our food system to meet the needs of the world’s growing population while reducing the resources needed to produce nutritious food,” said Stephen Van Helden, principal in the Bioindustrial Investments group at Novo Holdings United States. “Elo’s approach — together with cutting-edge science and an experienced management team — is aligned with Novo Holdings’ purpose to deliver scaled solutions for better societal and planetary outcomes.”Enjoying this content? Learn about more disruptive startups on the Food Entrepreneur page.
