Israeli agri-tech R&D partnership Smart Agro has announced that it is planning to raise NIS 25 million on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (TASE). Smart Agro, which will invest in startups that are developing technologies for agriculture and the cannabis industry, will be the first agri-tech R&D startup on the TASE. The IPO will be led by Leumi Partners Underwriters.
The Smart Agro public offering is being conducted after an amendment in February 2019 to TASE regulations in order to allow public offerings of limited partnerships in R&D. Prior to the amendment, the TASE only allowed partnerships operating in the oil and gas exploration and film production sectors to hold public offerings. In recent months, there have been IPOs by food-tech and healthcare R&D partnerships on the TASE.
Smart Agro is led by a management team with extensive knowhow in the agri-tech industry. CEO Omri Rothman previously served as CFO of bio agri-tech company Kaiima and as CFO of the Etgar venture capital fund. Chairman Erez Meltzer was formerly CEO of Gadot Chemicals, Africa Israel and Netafim. In recent years, VP finance and business development Limor Stoller was until recently CEO of Rootility.
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