ESA BIC incubatee Gravity Gardens has recently announced the highest amount raised by any startup while participating in the Dutch business incubation centre of the European Space Agency, ESA BIC Noordwijk. Since joining this ESA programme, the startup has secured a 2.6 million euros seed round to bring a new kind of seed activation to market: a dry process that improves establishment without adding water, chemicals or coating to the seed. The round was supported by VP Capital, Brightlands Venture Partners and Graduate Ventures alongside a group of private investors. The funding takes the company into its next phase, with market readiness targeted during 2027.
This is an edited version of the news release on the Gravity Gardens website
Gravity Gardens, founded in 2024 by Paulino Valdes (CEO) and Robin Le Vigouroux (CTO), has been developing its technology during incubation at ESA BIC Noordwijk. Inspired by space, the technology of Gravity Gardens’ innovation leverages space principles, precision and optimisation, to create breakthroughs in terrestrial food production. “What are two of the key elements for human evolution? Agriculture and technology. Gravity Gardens has combined these along with relentless passion to create solutions for the scalable food production of tomorrow. As our planetary needs grow, so does the team’s desire to innovate,” comments Jacobo Domingo Gil, the ESA BIC Noordwijk programme manager.
Funding takes company into its next phase
The innovative technology has been through seven external trials, including validation work by the Dutch applied research organisation Vertify. The current round was supported by VP Capital, Brightlands Venture Partners and Graduate Ventures alongside a group of private investors, follows earlier backing from StartLife and a Rabobank innovation loan, and combines equity investment with EFRO regional development funding.
This brings the total raised since the company was founded to more than 3 million euros and the new funding takes the company into its next phase – industrial-scale equipment development and larger trial programmes across new crops.
Bringing a new kind of seed activation to market
Improving a seed before it goes in the ground, what the industry calls ”seed activation technology,” is not a new idea. Seed companies have known for decades that a seed lot, given the right treatment, emerges faster, more evenly and holds up better in a difficult seedbed.
The problem was never whether it works. The problem is what it takes to do. Conventional priming is wet. The seed is hydrated, held under controlled conditions and dried back down again, a process that brings handling constraints, capacity limits and cost with it at every step. The economics have only ever closed on high-value vegetable and flower seed. For the overwhelming majority of crops by volume, seed activation has never been on the table at all.
Gravity Gardens on the European Space Agency website >>
New dry process – no chemicals or coating added to seeds
Taking water out of the process is what changes the economics, because there is no hydration stage to control and nothing to dry off afterwards. Where priming has been understood in the industry as a way to improve germination and uniformity, Gravity Gardens is working on vigour: how fast and how strongly a crop establishes itself once it is in the ground.
The process is the property of Gravity Gardens.
“Every seed company in Europe has a seed lot sitting in storage that germinates at grade A quality on the bench and then disappoints in the field. Germination matters, but it is not the number that decides your season – vigour is, and vigour is the first thing you lose as a lot ages or as the spring turns against you,” explains Paulino Valdés. “Priming has been the industry’s answer for 40 years and it is a good answer, but it is a wet one. The cost and complications that come with that are why it only ever made sense for a handful of high-value crops. What we have is dry, which takes those costs out. Cheap enough for field crops, and aimed at the thing that actually decides the season. That combination is what has not existed before.”
An industry being required to change
The seed sector is preparing for a significant change in what is allowed to go onto a seed. Regulation (EU) 2023/2055 restricts intentionally added synthetic polymer microparticles unless the polymer is degradable or soluble to the standard the regulation sets. Coated seeds used in agriculture and horticulture can no longer be placed on the market with them from 17 Oct 2028, and seed treated with plant protection products follows from 17 Oct 2031. The polymer coating that has held a treatment onto a seed for decades is what the restriction reaches. Reformulation work is under way across the industry well ahead of the deadlines.
The European Commission is explicit that the intention is for the sector to develop sustainable alternatives rather than lose these applications. That is the transition Gravity Gardens is built for. An industry now obliged to reduce what it puts onto a seed needs methods that add nothing at all, and that is what the company brings to it.
“We have a dry process, cheap enough for field crops and aimed at the thing that actually decides the season – that combination is what has not existed before”
Paulino vades, gravity gardens ceo
Validated and ready for scaling
The technology has been through seven external trials, including validation experiments run by Vertify. Gravity Gardens operates its own research, development and production facility in Nijmegen and runs active programmes with Vertify, HLB, Oost NL and Foodvalley, through which the company accessed an SME Innovation Voucher.
The scientific team is drawn from inside the industry. Benyamin Houshyani is in the Gravity Gardens team as the research operation partner. He has spent more than a decade in seed technology research at Bayer, following a PhD in plant physiology at Wageningen University. “The seed quality improvement industry has a real need for novel solutions. Gravity Gardens’ technology has the potential to meet that need, and contributing to its success is both a personal and a professional opportunity,” comments Dr Houshyani.
The funding covers the step from a working process to industrial machinery. Gravity Gardens is moving towards the development of industrial-scale equipment with Demcon, the Dutch engineering group, while trial programmes continue in parallel, laying the groundwork for a strong move towards volume.
This funding news was originally shared in early September by Gravity Gardens
Technical support via the European Space Agency is available for incubatees of ESA BIC Noordwijk.
NOTES FOR EDITORS
Media contact:
- Francisco van Lookeren, media@gravity-gardens.com
About Gravity Gardens
Inspired by space, Gravity Gardens is an agritech company developing a dry seed activation technology. Founded in 2024, the company is currently incubated at ESA BIC Noordwijk. The team, led by Paulino Valdes (CEO) and Robin Le Vigouroux (CTO), pushes the boundaries to develop innovative ways to grow crops. It is a new era in seed technology that leads to more resilient crops without the use of chemicals or water. The startup’s mission is to blend cutting-edge technology with sustainable practices to create efficient agricultural solutions. gravity-gardens.com
Open call for startups with space business ideas to apply to ESA BIC Noordwijk:
