Morfo completes its first round of financing with a €4M. The startup has therefore raised €11M in 18 months. A first round that is not classic when you look at the personalities around the investors' table. This seed fundraising extension was joined by two business angels: Antoine Dupont, captain of the France rugby team and Raphaël Varane, international football player and former defender of the France team.
The startup had already raised from Teampact Ventures, an investment fund that brings together many sportsmen and women in its LP's, including Nikola Karabatic, a famous handball player, Aurélien Tchouaméni, also in the France football team, and Ciryl Gane, an MMA fighter. «Deforestation and biodiversity loss have always been of great concern to me. My discussions with the founders of Morfo gave me a lot of hope. I am proud to participate in the financing and support of such a promising company", comments Raphaël Varane.
Investor-ambassadors
Welcoming such names among its investors is a nice spotlight for the startup. "Raphaël and Antoine, as well as other athletes who have already invested in Morfo, such as Nikola Karabatic and Malia Metella, have a great ability to get messages across," explains Pascal Asselin.
With this first round of funding, Morfo wants to accelerate its development in Brazil with the opening of a new laboratory in Rio. "This will strengthen our research and development capacity and optimise our operational and scientific processes to enable the expansion of our operations," says the founder.
Morfo has launched about twenty reforestation projects in Brazil in both the Amazon and the Atlantic Forest, as well as in French Guiana and Gabon. Morfo relies on drones to restore 100 million hectares of forests by 2050.
