Back to the North: Inside Fresh Start's Food-Tech Vision

The location of the Fresh Start food-tech incubator in Kiryat Shmona might seem counterintuitive at first glance. The companies it backs target the global food market, and its partners include some of the biggest names in the industry. Yet, its headquarters remain firmly planted in Israel's northernmost city.

Founded in 2020, Fresh Start operates as a partnership between Tnuva, Tempo, OurCrowd, and the American fund Siddhi Capital, backed by the Israel Innovation Authority. It invests in early-stage food-tech startups, typically for a period of two to three years, providing financing, business development, strategy building, and connections to partners and markets abroad.

Fresh Start at a Glance

• Focus: Investments and establishment of agri-food-tech companies

• History: Founded in 2020. Partners include Tnuva, Tempo, Siddhi Capital, the Innovation Authority, and OurCrowd

• Employees: 5

• Milestones: Made 18 investments totaling $35 million to date. Portfolio companies have independently raised over $120 million

The incubator was established at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic as part of a national initiative to build a food and agriculture ecosystem in Israel's north, centered around Tel-Hai Academic College (now Kiryat Shmona University). However, reality shifted dramatically since then. The war turned Kiryat Shmona into one of the most complex places in Israel to operate a technology company, and for a period, Fresh Start was forced to relocate. According to CEO Roni Patishi-Chaimov, full operations have only resumed in the past six months.

"If everything had been quiet, we probably never would have left," she states. "But the past three years were certainly not intuitive for anyone. I am in the north at least two to three days a week, and there is still a recovery that needs to happen here. For us, being here is both a business matter and a national goal."

Building an Agri-Food Hub

In Fresh Start's investor presentation, the return to Kiryat Shmona is marked as one of the key milestones of the past year. Its ecosystem map surrounds the incubator with the Migel Research Institute—located within Kiryat Shmona University—a food-tech industrial park, a planned national food institute, and additional infrastructure designed to transform the region into an agri-food-tech powerhouse.

The northern firm boasts a robust portfolio. Since its inception, Fresh Start has invested in 17 companies, with 11 currently active in the portfolio, representing a cumulative direct investment of over $35 million. The companies themselves have subsequently raised more than $120 million in additional funding.

One of the key partners in the incubator is the Innovation Authority, whose chairman, Mitchell Presser, describes it as a "true partner"—especially during a period when the war made it difficult for companies to raise capital from international investors. For Presser, who comes from the private equity world and has dedicated much of the past two decades to the food and agricultural industries, an incubator should be much more than just a source of a first check for entrepreneurs.

"Companies arrive at a very early stage and they need much more than just money," Presser says.

Next-Gen Ingredients and Supply Chains

The most compelling stories lie within the startups themselves. Fresh Start currently divides its investments into several core trends: healthier lifestyles and nutrition, next-generation raw materials, and cost reduction and waste minimization in the food industry.

BlueTree, for instance, has developed a technology that extracts a portion of the sugar from natural beverages—initially focusing on fruit juices, but with milk, wine, and beer also on the horizon—without turning the product into an artificial sweetener-based drink and without fundamentally altering the production process.

Another company, Plantopia, takes the concept of novel food in an entirely different direction: it produces casein, a primary milk protein, using "molecular farming." According to Patishi-Chaimov, the company has already established operations in the north and is building an additional facility following a significant funding round.

However, Fresh Start emphasizes that the next wave of food-tech is not necessarily another plant-based burger or lab-grown milk. In some cases, the innovation is entirely invisible to the consumer. DistanSea, for example, tackles the logistical challenge of transporting live seafood over long distances. During transit, ammonia accumulates in the water, limiting the duration of the journey and driving up costs. The technology developed by the company, originating from the Technion, aims to trap the ammonia and improve transport conditions.

Presser, who previously owned a major U.S. seafood company, is particularly enthusiastic.

"The potential implication is not just ammonia reduction," he says. "If live seafood can be transported for weeks instead of days, it completely reshapes the supply chain and the distance from which fresh products can be sourced."

The Advantage of Agility

Patishi-Chaimov points to cost as the primary barrier preventing an interesting invention from reaching store shelves. "In 2020 and 2021, there was a perception that consumers would be willing to pay a premium for an innovative, healthier, or more sustainable product," she notes. "The market proved that this is not necessarily true. And if there is a premium, it must be small."

Many food-tech companies must build dedicated production lines or facilities long before reaching the economies of scale of traditional food manufacturing. The result is heavy capital expenditure and high per-unit costs. Simultaneously, major food corporations, despite public declarations of innovation, are not always the first to introduce unproven technologies into their operations.

"When a young company starts out, it sometimes thinks the ultimate goal is to immediately partner with one of the world's largest food conglomerates," Patishi-Chaimov says. "But sometimes a small or medium-sized company is actually more willing to take the risk. They have less to lose and can be far more agile."

The incubator remains exceptionally optimistic regarding Israel. Years before food-tech became a fashionable investment sector, Israel had already built robust industries around seeds, irrigation, crop enhancement, and agricultural research. Now, the CEO and chairman argue, the competitive advantage may stem from bridging these traditional fields with AI, biology, robotics, and engineering.

"Israel has been innovative in agriculture for years," Patishi-Chaimov reminds. "But it is also uniquely positioned where different technologies must be integrated. Both Physical AI and molecular farming are fields where we believe we will see amazing things emerge from here."

Presser believes that global demand for increased protein and fiber may ultimately bring traditional agriculture back to the center of innovation. For him, this also serves as a necessary correction to the inflated expectations that characterized the peak years of food-tech. "There were periods when agriculture and food companies were viewed like tech startups, expected to be the next Google. That is not going to happen. But the direction the market is heading is much clearer, and we now have a better understanding of what the industry and consumers truly need."