Village Capital Agriculture Board Meeting at UC Davis

Join Village Capital on February 20, 2015, for our annual Board Meeting in partnership with the UC Davis Child Family Institute for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, showcasing 10 enterprises with game-changing innovations focusing on agricultural resource efficiency.

The VilCap USA Agriculture 2014 program is seeking the next generation of enterprises solving major agricultural problems in the US and emerging markets.

The Board Meeting is an engaging, intensive 3-hour session where you can take deep dives with all of the participating ventures, as well as network with other mentors and investors. Mentors and investors typically find this to be the best way to get to know the companies and also other peers in the industry.

The event information is as follows:

February 20, 2015, 4:00pm-6:00pm

Happy Hour with dinner and drinks immediately following at 6:00pm

UC Davis Graduate School of Management

1 Shields Ave.

Davis, CA 95616

Gallagher Hall Room #2310

Please RSVP by February 13, 2015.

For any questions or more information, contact Candice Orm at candice@vilcap.com.

The cohort of ten ag-tech companies has visited Louisville, KY for three, four-day sessions as part of an accelerator program where they have received training and mentorship. At the end of the program in Louisville, January 28th, the top two program participants will be selected by their peers to each receive a $50,000 USD investment. Following the end of their program in Louisville, the ten agriculture companies will visit Davis, CA where they will be participating in the Board Meeting on February 20th allowing mentors to act as mock board members to help them arrive at a strategic decision critical to their business. Following the Board Meeting is a Venture Forum/Pitchfest on February 21st where the 10 ventures pitch to mentors, investors, potential customers, and members of the greater Davis community. The Venture Forum serves as our second Davis-based Investor Day (see corresponding invitation to the Venture Forum).

The 6 ventures featured during the Board Meeting session are:

• Agribotix: Makes actionable intelligence for agriculture using drones.
• Iron Goat: Creates pelletized agricultural products directly from standing crops with no fossil fuel.
• IUNU: Designs energy efficient plasma lights and management solutions to make indoor farming profitable and environmentally friendly
• reNature, Inc.: Bioreactor technology processes food waste into fertilizer
• TekWear: Apps and software designed for wearable devices targeted for agriculture uses.
• Wildsense, LLC: Provides product for wireless underground soil moisture sensors and soil moisture information for irrigation management

About Village Capital

Village Capital sources, trains and invests in seed-stage social entrepreneurs around the world. Village Capital develops entrepreneurs solving specific problems in agriculture, energy, education, financial inclusion, and health, and then puts the power of investment in the hands of those entrepreneurs, who award investment capital to the two ventures ranked highest by their peers at the end of every program. The organization’s unique peer-selection model and curriculum received the prestigious McKinsey/Harvard Business Review M-Prize for innovation in 2013, and Village Capital has supported 400 enterprises across 30 accelerator programs in 7 countries in the last 5 years, creating 6,000 jobs and raising more than $100 million in follow-on capital.

About the UC Davis Child Family Institue for Innovation and Entrepreneurship

The UC Davis Child Family Institute for Innovation and Entrepreneurship integrates science and business for social benefit, through innovation and entrepreneurship education and outreach on campus and beyond. Their programs prepare forward thinkers-- from undergraduates to scientists and engineers-- to launch their Big Idea, research or other venture. Their mission is to teach students and faculty how to move their ideas forward, support and enhance technology transfer, and foster business development and industry interractions across campus.

Their programs help researchers and students build the networks, knowledge and tools to communicate the value of their work, explore commercialization strategies, connect with industry partners, and design research programs that address and align with practical applications. They move great ideas forward.