Munich Startup: Who are you and what does Agrando do? Please introduce yourselves briefly!
Jonathan Bernwieser, Agrando: I'm Jonathan Bernwieser, 32, grew up on a farm south of Munich and studied business informatics at the Technical University of Munich. Our founding team consists of five members who bring expertise from the fields of agriculture, venture capital, and impact investing.
We We make regional agricultural structures sustainable by connecting all market participants along the value chain and strengthening cooperation: Agricultural businesses can purchase inputs such as seeds and pesticides – tailored to their location – from retailers in their region. Retailers and manufacturers of inputs, in turn, use Agrando, for example, as an additional sales channel or to enter online trading.
Munich Startup: What problem does your startup solve?
Jonathan Bernwieser: The pressure on smaller agricultural businesses in particular is constantly increasing. They have little room for significant investments or even to try out new technologies and methods. Agrando supports them in making sound business decisions and positioning their farms for the future despite the increasing complexity.
Munich Startup: But that's been around for a long time!
Jonathan Bernwieser: No, not in this combination. We offer not only a trading platform, but also personalized, strategic support for purchasing and selling. We offer both the classic inquiry-quotation process and convenient direct purchasing. Each product category offers different filters and options. Our solution is as diverse as agriculture and agricultural trade itself.
“I founded Agrando twice”
Munich Startup: What have been your three biggest challenges so far?
Jonathan Bernwieser:
a. To preserve our values during the strong growth of the last few months.
b. Finding the right A-players at the same pace as your company grows.
c. Mapping the full complexity of agricultural trade structures: Identifying the true problem of inefficiencies and finding the right solution for them was one of the biggest challenges. I founded Agrando twice. The first idea, a simple brokerage platform where farmers could create purchase requests for inputs, proved unprofitable and, above all, not internationally scalable. All other business models we tried on the market were also unsuitable. So, in 2017, we started from scratch and incorporated all our experience into the current Agrando concept – and it works!
Munich Startup: How are things going?
Jonathan Bernwieser: Around 1,000 new farmers register on the platform every month (total number of registered farmers: over 20,000). The Agrando team has tripled in size every year since its founding, and today we have 170 employees. In 2020, we expanded to Austria, and in 2021, we launched our French market.
The entire agricultural trade is currently facing digital transformation: 10.5 million farms in Europe supply 510 million consumers. Market studies estimate that online agricultural trade will be worth up to ten billion euros by 2025.
Munich Startup: How do you rate Munich as a startup location?
Jonathan Bernwieser: We see Munich as a very good location: It has a strong technological base and is surrounded by and connected to numerous agricultural companies. The top universities in Munich and the surrounding area also attract talent.
Munich Startup: Tea or coffee?
Jonathan Bernwieser: Coffee.
