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Amatera

Category: AI in Agriculture

French biotech startup using plant cell culture, robotics, and AI to accelerate the breeding of climate-resilient perennial crops, starting with coffee and wine grapes. Amatera was founded in 2022. The company is led by Omar Dekkiche. Based in Paris, France. Team size: 11-50. Total funding raised: $8.6M. Latest round: Seed. Key investors include Demea Sustainable Investment, Oyster Bay Venture Capital, PINC (Paulig's venture arm), Exceptional Ventures, Mudcake, Joyance Partners, AgFunder.

Founded
2022
Headquarters
Paris, France
Team size
11-50
Total funding
$8.6M

Value proposition

Non-GMO platform that accelerates perennial crop breeding by 2x faster and 10x more cost-effective than industry standards, by moving the screening bottleneck from greenhouse to cell culture using AI and robotics.

Products and solutions

CellTera platform (combines plant cell culture, high-throughput robotics automation, and AI/ML to screen plant cell lines at the cellular level), Robustica (climate-resilient coffee variety with Robusta resilience and Arabica taste), Naturally caffeine-free Arabica coffee, Mildew-resistant Merlot wine grape

Unique value

Combines plant cell biology, robotics automation, and machine learning to screen at the cellular level — identifying desirable genetic traits without growing full plants, dramatically reducing time and cost for developing climate-resilient, non-GMO perennial crop varieties.

Target customer

Seed companies, agrifood companies, coffee trading houses, research institutes, and large food companies seeking climate-resilient crop varieties or licensing partnerships.

Industries served

Agriculture (perennial crops: coffee, wine grapes, expanding to annual row crops and vegetable crops), Food & Beverage

Technology advantage

Proprietary CellTera platform combining plant cell culture, high-throughput robotics, and AI/ML for cellular-level screening; Non-GMO approach (accelerated natural evolution via physical/chemical induction of spontaneous genetic variation, no gene editing); 2x faster and 10x more cost-effective than industry standards; No regulatory approval needed for non-GMO varieties

How they differentiate

Unlike competitors focused on gene editing (CRISPR) or seed-based approaches, Amatera uses non-GMO accelerated natural evolution at the cellular level combined with AI-driven high-throughput screening — avoiding regulatory hurdles while dramatically compressing breeding timelines for perennial crops from 20+ years to a fraction of that.

Main competitors

OlsAro (Sweden) — AI-enabled trait discovery for climate-adapted crops, Pluri (Israel) — plant cell culture technology, California Cultured (USA) — plant cell culture for coffee, Coffeesai (Singapore) — cell-based coffee

Key partnerships

Paulig (via PINC investment and strategic partnership for coffee), Wine grape partnership (undisclosed partner for mildew-resistant Merlot), Partnerships with seed companies for annual row crops and vegetable crops (in development), CIRAD (French agricultural research organization, tropical agriculture research), Bpifrance / ADEME (France2030 government innovation funding support)

Major milestones

Founded May 2022 via Entrepreneur First at Station F, Paris, Oct 2023: €1.5M pre-seed round led by PINC, Mar 2026: €6M seed round co-led by Demea Sustainable Investment and Oyster Bay Venture Capital, First production expected 2027, Expanding from coffee/wine grapes to annual crops

Market positioning

Early-stage French biotech/agtech startup positioned at the intersection of AI, robotics, and plant biology, targeting the urgent need for climate-resilient perennial crop varieties. Currently focused on coffee and wine grapes with plans to expand to annual crops via platform licensing.

Geographic focus

Europe (France-based), with global ambitions for coffee (Latin America, Africa, Asia) and wine grapes (Europe, Americas)

About Omar Dekkiche

Ex-BNP Paribas Corporate and Institutional Banking (M&A banker); Co-Founder at GeminiQuant; Biotech Startup Founder via Entrepreneur First; Engineer graduate from Ecole nationale supérieure des Mines de Saint-Etienne

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