Chris Janiec
CEO Michael Gilbert said the agtech firm's profit-making status puts it in a position to acquire companies that will 'close the loop on risk mitigation and decision-making.'
Firm partner Adam Oliver says institutional farmland managers’ efforts to broaden portfolios and diversify risk is helping create interest in the country.
The firm’s investor base includes LPs ‘that have distribution channels outside of North America that are looking for assets like this’ says COO Brent Drever.
Managing partner Nick Dilks said the size of EIP’s Fund IV meant larger LPs could make commitments, which helped the firm hit its hard-cap.
Curtis Buono and Jeremy Darner said they expect to focus largely on helping institutional investors deploy funds in California farmland markets increasingly shaped by the SGMA.
Foodservice is likely to be the primary customer base on which Wonderful builds out its production, given the popularity of seedless lemons in food preparation industries.
The fund will focus on deals averaging $20m to create a portfolio of row and permanent crops with its first four investments targeting permanent cropland in California.
Chief investment officer Geert Peetermans says the change reflects a natural evolution towards investor-favorable structures within the rapidly developing impact investing market.
Commitments from the likes of AOL co-founder Steve Case’s investment firm and NBA player Blake Griffin show 'it’s an exciting time to be in agriculture,' says founder and chief executive Jonathan Webb.
The $713m pension’s search is being led by Segal Macro Advisors, which advised the Cambridge Retirement Board on a similar 2017 search resulting in a $15m commitment to the Hancock Timberland and Farmland Fund.