Investment Climate Podcast: Charles Pontvianne of planetary Shares How to Get Funded in 2026

In this episode of the Investment Climate Podcast, host Alex Shandrovksy interviews Charles Pontvianne, CFO of Planetary, a Swiss biotech startup that recently raised a massive 16 million CHF Series A funding round. The funding was co-led by Radical Capital and Oetker Group, and Planetary stands out for its unique approach of licensing biomanufacturing IP to legacy sugar producers, allowing them to upcycle sucrose side-streams into high-protein B2B ingredients. The company successfully navigated ethical concerns by focusing on producing "Food-for-Food" instead of "Food-for-Fuel," and secured a reorder from retail giant Aldi for their vegan chicken fillet, which helped derisk their Series A investment.

Planetary operates as a full-stack fermentation platform in Switzerland, offering infrastructure-as-a-service for the bioeconomy. Their BioBlocks fermentation and AI platform handles scale-up, process optimization, and production of mycoprotein ingredients, precision fermentation-derived products, and bio-based materials. They aim to act as the missing link between industrial agriculture and FoodTech by providing clients access to their facilities, platform, and expertise to bring fermentation-based products to market with optimized COGS and sustainability metrics. Through their innovative approach and successful fundraising, Planetary is making strides in the climate tech space.