Ramat Gan, Israel-based ansā, a pioneer in on-demand zero-pollution roasting, today announced it has secured $6 million in a seed round investment led by Millennium Food-Tech (TASE: MIFT), the largest R&D partnership on Tel Aviv Stock Exchange.
MFT, which focuses on food technology investments, is joined by Closed Loop Ventures Group and New Climate Ventures, two U.S.-based early-stage funds focused on initiatives that promote circular economies and impact-driven investments.
Ansā’s roasting technology enables on-demand green coffee roasting to take place in an office breakroom. The result, according to the company, is a gourmet hyper-fresh coffee and elimination of unnecessary international transportation of coffee beans and the multi-laminate packaging required to artificially preserve roasted beans.
The new capital stream is expected to advance ansā's R&D and complete the productization of its Barista standalone roaster. Accordingly, this will lead to the production of thousands of units to be deployed in U.S. workplaces through select office coffee service operators. Ansā said that its micro roasting devices have already been deployed in offices in Israel.
“We are honored to have Millennium Food-Tech join our quest to change the world of coffee. “ said ansā chief executive Yuval Weisglass. “Their vast experience in bringing innovative solutions and disrupting the legacy food industry is key to the success of ansā and is exactly what we were looking for in the investors that we partner with.”
After the serviced office coffee market suffered a 75% drop in sales volume during the 2020 pandemic, it is quickly recovering and is expected to return to its pre-COVID state by 2024, ansā forecast. The company said the OCS market has seen an 8% demand increase for environmentally friendly and sustainable offerings compared to last year, totaling an 52.6% of businesses that demand suppliers comply with sustainability practices.
"Operators are responding to market demands, offering more sustainable and high-quality coffee and other breakroom perks," said Weisglass, who added that ansā is leading the on-demand, non-industrial and sustainable coffee roasting revolution.
Millennium Food-Tech chief executive Chanan Schneider said, “Our fund is focused on the food-tech space, and we’ve seen the growing interest in healthy, sustainable and eco-friendly solutions across the board. Nowhere perhaps is this true more than the coffee industry."
