Gr?o Direto raises new investment round and strengthens its leadership in the digitization of agricultural trading in Latin America

In a remarkable move in the sector, trading companies ADM, Amaggi, Cargill and LDC have become minority partners in the platform, moving forward in forming a complete digital grain trading ecosystem, including among its investors: farmers, buyers, industry, venture capital, and financial institutions.

Uberaba, March 03, 2022 – Gr?o Direto, the largest digital grain trading platform in Latin America, will now have ADM, Amaggi, Cargill and Louis Dreyfus Company (LDC) as new investors, joining Bayer, Lanx, Grupo Rendimento, Barn, and other funds and individual investors, such as prominent international executives and farmers. The four new partners will participate in the third round of investment held by Gr?o Direto, which will inject more than R$ 40 million Brazilian reais into the startup and accelerate the digitization of agricultural commodity trading, giving the platform a real boost in volume, revenue, market share, liquidity, new clients, and scale throughout Brazil and potentially other countries. The deal announced today has been submitted for analysis by Brazil's antitrust body, CADE.

The platform, which will continue to operate independently, provides an app that has been downloaded more than 190,000 times and has had broadly positive ratings, which is a differential in the agribusiness sector. This recognition puts Gr?o Direto on the same level of companies in other sectors, recognized for its digital transformation and excellent client experience. All this indicates the reach among and engagement with farmers in embracing digital processes. "Innovation is in Brazilian farmers' DNA. The same digital revolution that has happened inside the farm gate is happening outside the gate", says Alexandre Borges, Gr?o Direto′s CEO.

In 2021, the platform made more than 200,000 purchase and sale offers available. The company has reached a million tons in digitally connected deals, serving different audiences, from small grain growers to large groups in sales processes, small poultry or swine farmers to large international trading companies, cooperatives, feed plants, resellers, brokers, and all the other profiles in purchase transactions. In the last two years, the platform's clients have done digitally connected deals in more than 1,100 cities, and the company's revenue has grown by 15 times.

Two of the new partners, ADM and LDC, already use Gr?o Direto's services and have experienced in practice the positive impact of digitization on the business. Amaggi and Cargill, in addition to investors, will also use Gr?o Direto′s solutions, joining the hundreds of grain-buying companies that already use the platform, trading with thousands of farmers in several states that access the marketplace daily. "Technology democratizes innovation. Today, with Gr?o Direto, a small buyer can use the same platform as the world's largest agribusiness companies, providing a broad digital relationship on another level with farmers, regardless of their size," adds Borges.

The diversified investor group - combining various sectors and profiles; Gr?o Direto's partnerships, such as the innovative direct connection agreement with the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME Group); the breadth of its solutions throughout a 100% digital negotiation process; and, finally, the results and volumes already achieved by the platform, make Gr?o Direto as the most promising digital grain marketplace in the world.

This third investment round consolidates the company's vision of building a safety digital ecosystem around agricultural commodity trading and expanding further. Gr?o Direto, which already had strategic investors in its previous rounds, moves forward with the entry of these four new companies, and the goal is to keep growing. "Just as stock exchanges around the world emerged from the collaboration of various market operators, we want to continue bringing in new strategic investors, be they buyers, distributors, cooperatives, the industry or, obviously, farmers," explains Alexandre. "Agriculture is very diverse, and we want to replicate this diversity here, reinforcing our neutrality, independence, and innovation for the good of modern agriculture in Brazil and worldwide," says the CEO.

The company already plans new investment rounds in the next 18 months and forecasts a potential IPO in the next five years, throughout this process allowing the platform's users and clients to become partners. "Our users are our greatest ambassadors, and we are studying ways to make it possible, in the future, for them to be part of this huge opportunity" explains Alexandre.?

This new investment will speed up this journey. Planned investments will include further growth of its team (which increased five-fold 2021, from 15 to 75 professionals), a presence throughout Brazil, expansion of the product portfolio, technological development to offer even more complete trading services – including financial products – and the expansion of data and market intelligence services.

ESG

Sustainability is also a priority for Gr?o Direto, and the new investors and the startup are expected to collaborate to further boost initiatives in this area.

Recently, Gr?o Direto began to provide the "Sustainability Practices Badge" on the platform, developed in collaboration with Bayer's global sustainability team, showing which farmers are using practices that are most beneficial to the environment. In addition to the badge, other ESG-related data, organized from different sources —such as government agencies and monitoring and compliance companies — are used to check, for example, labor conformities and compliance with other social and environmental guidelines.

"Digitizing agricultural commodity trading will make a huge contribution to sustainability efforts as it will allow better traceability, automation, and much more collaboration in ESG practices between different players along the supply chain. The future of agriculture is digital and sustainable, and Brazil can be a protagonist in this transformation. At Gr?o Direto, we want to be a great facilitator and encourager of this movement," concludes Alexandre Borges.

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About Gr?o Direto

Gr?o Direto is the leading platform in digital grain trading in Latin America, serving thousands of farmers and buyers, such as feed plants, cooperatives, trading companies, warehouses, brokers, cattle feedlots, farms, and so on. The platform may operate in the spot and futures market and in barter operations, which involve the exchange of inputs for future production. Farmers and buyers in Brazil can download the app for free on their mobile devices or connect via computer to gain access to services. With the app, the users have access to various services and support from Gr?o Direto. The company also offers customized solutions for users, supporting them in their digital transformation. These services include market intelligence, supplier base digitization, digital contracts, and document management, real-time grain pricing tools based on inputs defined by the user, origination insights, and integration with social and environmental compliance solutions. All this is to make grain trading more efficient, modern, and sustainable. The platform has been in the ranking of the 100 Startups to Watch for four years in a row and has won several other Brazilian and international awards, as well as a globally unique collaboration agreement with the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME Group). For further information, please visit www.graodireto.com.br. ??

PRESS INFORMATION

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Tatiana Fontenele

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