India’s String Bio secures backing to convert methane to eco-feed products

ImpactAlpha, July 1 – Bangalore-based String Bio launched in 2012 to “address the impending food crisis” by helping the global food system ramp up sustainable sources of protein to feed a growing population. Its technology runs a double-duty, converting methane, a potent greenhouse gas, that would otherwise end up in the atmosphere into usable products, like animal feed.

“What occurs today is that methane gas gets burnt off, called flaring, converting it to CO2, and consequently is released into the environment. So our thinking is why not leverage the carbon to make useful products instead of burning it off?” String Bio founder Ezhil Subbian said in an interview. “When you use methane to make value-added products, you can make those products in a much more cost-effective way.”

String Bio is working to commercialize its first product, String Pro, which will enable feed producers to make high-quality but environmentally-sustainable feed varieties.

The company has raised an undisclosed amount of funding from French venture capital fund Seventure Partners and India’s state-owned Oil & Natural Gas Corporation. (The fossil fuels sector is the biggest producer of methane, followed closely by agriculture.) Impact investor Ankur Capital also backed the round, alongside poultry company Srinivasa Hatcheries and the state of Karnataka’s Information and Biotechnology Venture Fund. 

Unitus Capital advised the deal.

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