Israeli food-tech company NextFerm Technologies Ltd. has completed its initial public offering (IPO) on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange, raising NIS 30 million at a company valuation of NIS 115 million. Yokneam-based NextFerm also raised NIS 5 million from existing investors including Cider Holdings, Orgad Agricultural Cooperative, Ortal, Gadot, Arancia International, and Merage venture capital.
NextFerm develops novel active food ingredients based on yeast and fermentation. The company will be traded alongside many other food-tech companies on the TASE that have held IPOs in the past year including Meat Tech, Millennium Food-Tech, SavorEat, Bio Milk (through a reverse merger with Fantasy Network) and several other companies that are planning IPOs or mergers into shell companies.
NextFerm was founded by former senior executives with Enzymotec, which developed fatty acids for food additives and baby food and which was acquired by Frutarom in 2017. NextFerm CEO Boaz Noy was head of Enzymotec's food ingredients division and chairman Yossi Peled was chairman of Enzymotec and former Galam CEO.
To date the company has had limited revenue with sales of $27,000 in the first nine months of 2020 in the US and a net loss of $2 million.
Noy said, "There is a feeling that the market understands the potential in the food-tech sector and in particular for special proteins, and that is a change compared with the past. We have succeeded in reaching the market relatively early in this busy quarter and there was demand for the offering and great interest by the public."
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on January 26, 2021
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