Van Puijenbroek family office VP Capital invests in agtech Gravity Gardens

Gravity Gardens, a Dutch agricultural technology company based in Nijmegen, has raised 2.6 million euros in a seed round combining equity and EFRO regional development funding, with VP Capital investing alongside Brightlands Venture Partners and Graduate Ventures. Total funding now stands above 3 million euros, and earlier support came from StartLife and a Rabobank innovation loan. The company has developed a dry seed activation technology that helps crops establish more strongly and withstand stress, drought in particular, without water, chemicals or coating. That distinguishes it from conventional wet priming, which adds handling constraints and cost and limits how long treated seed can be stored. Gravity Gardens runs a dedicated Nijmegen facility that combines research, development and production, is a member of the ESA Business Incubation Centre in Noordwijk, and works with Vertify, HLB and HAN University on trials. Seven external trial programmes have been completed, including validation by Vertify. The new money will fund industrial-scale equipment built with Demcon and larger trials across additional crops, with market readiness targeted for 2027.

About VP Capital: The Van Puijenbroek family office

VP Capital is the family office of the van Puijenbroek family, with roots going back more than 150 years to 1865, when Hendrik van Puijenbroek established a textile company. Six generations later the business has become an investment firm, and VP Capital describes that transition in its own words as an evolution from a family business into a family office. It works from Goirle in the Netherlands and Turnhout in Belgium with a team of seventeen. The firm states that it invests with one thing in mind, driving a positive impact, and concentrates on biodiversity, climate and social equality. In 2024 it inverted its own model so that impact leads and is assessed through a financial lens, where previously the reverse applied. It invests across five asset classes, namely direct growth-stage investments, direct ventures, funds, real estate through VP Vastgoed and listed equity, and across five domains: agri-food, built environment, clean technology, energy and textile. VP Capital is B Corp certified and a signatory to the Science Based Targets initiative and the Finance for Biodiversity Pledge. Its portfolio includes Orbisk, Mariva Materials, Affix Labs, Solarix, Fiber Foods, BYBORRE and Trunkrs.

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Article Source: VP Capital [September 9, 2026]