Financing farm financing.
It’s not as confusing as it sounds. British agtech startup Breedr recently secured a £12M ($15.8M USD) Series A round of funding for its livestock management software—specifically to help develop and scale the app’s farm financing capabilities in the UK, with plans to expand to the U.S. and Australia.
Data, data, data: Breedr is first and foremost an electronic recordkeeping system for tracking weight, health, medication, genetics, and fertility in livestock. Farmers can either manually input the data into their smartphones or utilize a suite of wearables/tags to record the information. This data then helps farmers proactively manage their operations.
Keep the money rolling: Access to finance is a major difficulty for many livestock producers, especially in the UK. Breedr wants to help farmers “release cash from their livestock in order to invest in expanding their business” through its Breedr Cashflow product.
For animals being monitored through the app, Breedr plans to offer advances to the farmer as the animals grow and gain weight, therefore increasing in value.
Craigslist for cattle: Breedr has also built its own online livestock marketplace. Here’s what Ian Whel, founder and CEO of Breedr, has to say about it: “There is a growing demand from farmers who don’t like the stress that markets put on animals or the extra transport that is required. On average, our transaction costs are £35 per head lower on an animal, and this can be a farmer’s profit margin.