Avolta has acted as the sole financial advisor to Toopi Organics on its €16m Series A round, led by VisVires New Protein, alongside impact funds Edaphon, Noshaq, MAIF Impact, as well as BNP Paribas Développement, and existing investors, including IRDI, JOHES and MakeSense. In addition to attracting €11m in equity, Toopi Organics secured €5m of non-dilutive funding from ADEME and Bpifrance.
Founded in 2019 near Bordeaux by Michael Roes, Toopi Organics is a high-impact biotechnology French startup company specializing in the collection and transformation of human urine into microbial plant biostimulants for agricultural use. As Michael Roes says: ‘Ending urination in drinking water, and seeing urine as a natural resource, were seen as funny, offbeat ideas when Toopi started… Since, a scientific consensus on the benefits of human urine diversion and upcycling has emerged.’
As a matter of fact, as droughts and water restrictions are surging throughout the world, water appears as a strategic resource of the utmost importance for the years to come. And due to the war in Ukraine, there were unprecedented fertilizer shortages in 2022, with prices skyrocketing by up to 300%.
Toopi Organics has created new opportunities for water conservation and for the transition to a more sustainable and resilient farming model.
Within 3 years the company set up a unique urine collection network in France and obtained market approvals in 6 EU member states for a first-in-class microbial biostimulant, based on the fermentation of human urine.
This fundraising will enable Toopi Organics, now with an established team of 27, to expand its urine collection network, reinforce its production capacitites and to deploy a range of products across Europe, with the objective to reach 600’000 hectares in 2027, i.e. 2 million liters of transformed human urine or +24 million liters of drinking water saved.
This is yet another deal for Avolta in sustainability-related businesses, confirming our leadership in this space, having recently advised BeFC on its Series A led by Otium Capital, Woodoo on its first fundraising led by Lowercarbon Capital, Invers on its Series A led by IDIA Capital Investissement and Agri Impact (Citizen Capital), Jungle on its Series A led by Demeter and Founders Future, Weenat on its Series A led by IDIA Capital Investissement, or Qarnot on its Series B with A/O Proptech and Casino.
