Venture food: A sociological study of venture capital, #foodtech innovation and the future of food

This chapter examines visions for sustainable food futures with a specific focus on entrepreneurial solutions proposed by agricultural and food start-ups. Proponents of this current technology-focused wave of food entrepreneurship claim that their ‘solutions in the making’ contribute to a sustainable food future; these claims resemble those made by alternative food networks. The chapter explores three Swiss food start-ups that have each developed novel means of food production and consumption, including indoor agriculture and insect-based foods. Based on analysis of each start-up’s website, and supplemented by interviews and short field visits, the chapter considers how the start-ups propose to contribute to a sustainable food future, and the extent to which each draws on and ‘mainstreams’ alternative food networks’ ambitions and goals. The analysis reveals that, rather than signalling the adoption of alternative food networks’ goals, food start-ups are contributing to the entrepreneurial redefinition of what constitutes ‘sustainable food’ and how this can be achieved. These processes of ongoing redefinition and their implications have the potential to shape collective ideas of how (best) to achieve food security.

One prominent form of organising innovation in technoscientific capitalism is through provisioning platforms for exchange and networking such as industry conferences or trade fairs. In this paper I explore the role these events play in the making of a new industry (Leivestad and Nyqvist, 2017) drawing on my ethnographic research into the emerging FoodTech sector – a growing sector populated by entrepreneurs and investors that state to share the goal to disrupt the food industry. Conceptually, I approach conferences as spectacles (Rethel, 2018). Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork, interviews as well as media analysis of live streamed or video recorded foodtech conferences, I argue that these events open up visions of alternative food futures (cf. Schneider, 2018) that are presented as investment opportunities. I examine the rationales and aims for staging and narrating food futures in particular ways. I also emphasise the role that setting (e.g., the stage etc.) and set-up, frequently organized as a spectacle, play in promoting entrepreneurs’ visions, and reflect how the spectacular set-up is connected to capitalization and assetization (cf. Muniesa et al. 2017, Birch and Muniesa, in press). In other words, I show how food is turned into an asset and argue that spectacularisation is a central process for doing so. Ultimately, my research shows how conferences and similar events are spectacles of/for assetization. I contribute to current STS research on markets, values and assetization by putting the spotlight on industry conferences as spaces of spectacularisation central to assetization and the making of new industries or industry sectors.