Robigo Bio raises Series A to commercialize crop biologicals

US startup Robigo Bio has raised a Series A round to accelerate the commercialization of engineered microbial products for agriculture, with two crop biologicals already moving toward market launch. According to AgFunderNews, the company is targeting soybean Sudden Death Syndrome with a seed treatment planned for 2028 and fusarium wilt in lettuce and berries with a second product expected in 2029.

The financing was led by Leaps by Bayer, with participation from Illumina Ventures, SVG Thrive, Congruent Ventures and Endeavor8. Financial terms were not disclosed.

The new capital will also support regulatory work, product development and expansion into soil-borne pathogens affecting broad-acre crops, a market Robigo estimates at $10 billion.

Founded and based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Robigo is developing engineered microbes designed to deliver biological active ingredients directly to crops. Its approach differs from conventional microbial biologicals, which typically rely on naturally occurring organisms selected for useful characteristics.

Robigo instead selects microbes based on factors such as shelf stability and manufacturing economics, then engineers additional traits into them. The company uses computational design to program microbes to produce specific active ingredients while incorporating safety characteristics.

“We identify microbes that serve as a really solid foundation to build high-performing products on top of — they have the shelf stability, they have the manufacturing capabilities to be cost-effective — and then we engineer in these new traits that allow us to be much higher performing than what biologicals are doing today, and also have a really improved safety profile,” founder and CEO Dr. Andee Wallace told AgFunderNews.

The company's goal is to make the products easy to integrate into existing farming practices. Its engineered microbes are designed to be applied as a one-time seed treatment and produce active ingredients throughout the growing season.

The company also says its products do not require cold-chain storage, an important consideration for agricultural biologicals because refrigeration can add complexity and cost to distribution.

“Growers shouldn’t have to choose between a product that works and one that’s affordable or sustainable. If you go out and talk with growers, you know what they want: something that’s simple that works with what they’re doing today.”

Robigo's proprietary ARGO platform combines microbial strain engineering, strain selection and computational design of the biological compounds produced by the microbes. The company says the platform can reduce development time from an industry norm of roughly three to five years to less than 20 months from design to field testing.

The company says its first field trials took place last year after receiving clearance from the USDA and EPA to deploy a living engineered microbe with new traits.

Early results have provided the basis for Robigo's commercialization strategy. The company says its soybean treatment is on track to match the performance of existing chemical products at half the cost. Sudden Death Syndrome causes an estimated $200 million to $500 million in annual losses for US soybean farmers.

For its specialty-crop product, Robigo reported a threefold increase in yield compared with untreated controls in early trials involving fusarium wilt.

The Series A funding will help the company move those products through registration and toward commercial launch. Robigo has already started the regulatory process for its soybean seed treatment, an important step for a product category involving engineered organisms whose regulatory framework is still developing.

The financing builds on a relationship between Robigo and Leaps by Bayer, Bayer's venture investment arm. Dr. Juergen Eckhardt, executive vice president and head of Leaps by Bayer, said Robigo is developing a broader platform rather than focusing on a single product.

Robigo previously raised its seed round at the end of 2022, closing the financing in early 2023. Wallace said the current investment environment remains challenging, but field data helped demonstrate the company's commercial potential.

The company now plans to use the new capital to continue regulatory work, advance its two lead products and expand research into additional soil-borne pathogens.

For Robigo, the broader opportunity is to turn engineered microbes into a repeatable biologicals development platform capable of addressing multiple crop diseases while fitting into existing agricultural workflows.