Lithuania-based HeavyFinance, a climate tech investment marketplace for the agricultural industry, announced on Thursday that it has secured €3M in a Seed round of funding.
The round was led by Lithuania’s Practica Capital, an early-stage venture capital fund dedicated to backing Baltic founders.
Practica Capital invests in the Seed, selected pre-Seed and A stages of a round, and manages four funds with over €80M in AUM. The firm has invested in 50 companies to date.
Arvydas Bložė, Partner at Practica Capital, says, “HeavyFinance team is committed to transforming the traditional agricultural lending marketplace by incentivising farmers to adopt sustainable and regenerative farming practices by providing them access to the necessary capital.”
“By connecting farmers in Europe directly and introducing a proprietary soil-based carbon credit methodology, we anticipate creating a new channel for downstream corporates to offset their carbon credits and stimulating institutional capital investments in the green sector.”
About HeavyFinance
Founded in 2020 by Andrius Liukaitis, Darius Verseckas, and Laimonas Noreika, HeavyFinance aims to reduce CO2 emissions by 1 gigaton by 2050, and hence offers funding and loan programmes for companies in the sustainable agriculture sphere.
The company’s platform connects investors, from retail to institutional, with European farmers who are in need of outside funding to grow their operations and transition to sustainable agriculture.
Noreika says, “Tackling climate change must be a united effort, and with almost a third of global greenhouse emissions coming from agricultural products, HeavyFinance is here to lead the charge in the agricultural sector.”
“Food growth plays a vital part in the climate battle as a prominent global issue, and connecting investors with farmers and agricultural specialists through our finance platform can help accelerate the adoption of regenerative soil management practices to reduce carbon emissions output throughout Europe.”
As of now, HeavyFinance says it has assisted over 1,000 agricultural enterprises in Bulgaria, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, and Portugal in raising funds.
The funding provided by HeavyFinance supports:
- Soil health and maintenance, to lower emissions from the burning of fossil fuels in machinery
- Remove CO2 from the atmosphere through plant biogeochemical processes
- Reduce N2O pollution from the overuse of fertilisers,
- Increase biodiversity
- Help farms adapt to the effects of climate change, such as draughts and high temperatures
In order to speed up deals and better manage loans, the company has developed an underlying infrastructure to evaluate farmers’ and farming managers’ borrowing capacities.
Currently, HeavyFinance is operational in Poland, Portugal, Lithuania, Latvia, and Bulgaria.
Capital utilisation
HeavyFinance says it will use the funds to continue its European expansion as well as nearly double its current workforce of 33 employees over the next 12 months.
Additionally, the funds will also help speed up the transition from conventional farming to regenerative methods, enrol 200,000 hectares of regenerative farmland in a carbon farming project, and establish direct access for companies seeking to reduce their carbon impact.
Noreika says, “Operating in additional markets and expanding our investor suite is an important step in the company’s growth and the development of new products and schemes, alongside bringing in industry experts to support our journey will be a priority over the coming months.”
