By Gerelyn Terzo, Global AgInvesting Media
As Southeast Asia’s deep-tech landscape matures, venture capital firms are racing to fund the next generation of startups transforming food, climate and the ag industry. Singapore’s Origgin Capital, the investment engine behind Origgin Ventures, has stepped up to the plate, most recently launching its second venture fund, Origgin Capital Fund 2, with a target size of S$30 million (US$23 million). The fund aims to back up to several dozen early-stage deep-tech startups across Southeast Asia and China, with a sharpened focus on agri-food innovation and sustainability-driven technologies.
Building on the momentum of its inaugural S$10 million (US$tktk) fund launched in 2022, this latest investment vehicle doubles Origgin’s capital pool and reaffirms its commitment to advancing commercially viable innovations across sectors like precision agriculture, alternative proteins and digital supply chain solutions.
Origgin Capital Founder and Managing Partner Clarence Tan commented, “Fund 2 represents our continued commitment to bridge the gap between the lab and industry — ensuring promising research becomes industry-ready and delivers global impact.”
Image Source: Origgin Capital on LinkedIn
Origgin relies on a venture co-creation model through which it transforms academic research into real-world startups. By identifying promising technologies within universities, the firm builds founding teams, connects them with corporate partners and provides a clear path to market. This hands-on approach shortens the timeline from lab to launch and helps ensure scientific breakthroughs don’t remain stuck in research but evolve into scalable, investment-ready businesses. The model is particularly useful in sectors like agri-food and climate-resilient systems, where the commercialization rate of university-led innovation has historically lagged.
The firm’s operational footprint spans Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Japan and China. As part of Fund 2’s cross-border strategy, Origgin has partnered with Chinese incubator Tsinghua Technology Ventures as well as Singapore’s Jinan Xianxing to harness China’s deep-tech ecosystem while maintaining Southeast Asia as a regional anchor. Though the fund will support a broad range of innovation, agri-food solutions are a strategic priority, aligned with global investor interest in sustainable food production, climate-smart farming and supply chain traceability.
Origgin Capital posted on LinkedIn, “Through our strategic partnership with Jinan Xianxing (Singapore) and Tsinghua Technology Ventures (investment platform of TusStar), Fund 2 opens direct pathways for our portfolio companies into China’s vast market, supply chain, and innovation ecosystem!”
The fund launch comes at a time of broader regional pullback; According to a report in Deal Street Asia, Southeast Asian startup funding in June fell nearly 50 percent month-over-month. Origgin’s new fund overrides that trend, signaling confidence in early-stage, impact-focused innovation even as other investors retreat.
According to DealStreetAsia, Origgin is targeting seed and pre-Series A companies, helping to address one of the most persistent gaps in agtech investing: access to early capital. Its co-creation model also lowers founder risk by pairing strong technical IP with commercially experienced teams and pilot-ready partners. With both regional depth and a China-facing network, Origgin Fund 2 aims to bridge innovation pipelines between research hubs and real-world deployment.
Fund 2 is expected to begin deploying capital in the coming months, with a first close anticipated by year-end 2025. For agri-food entrepreneurs across Asia-Pacific, the fund brings together something you don’t often see: strong science, local expertise and long-term capital. That mix puts it in a solid position to help drive the next wave of innovation in the way the region grows, produces and delivers food.
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