UBERABA, BRAZIL — Grão Direto, a Brazilian platform expert on online agricultural commodities trading, secures new investment to increase its enrolled users from 70,000 to 500,000 by the end of 2022, including rural producers, employees, big and small buyers and brokers.

The total R$18 million investment will allow Grão Direto to expand its current geographical operations from Minas Gerais, Goiás and São Paulo, to the main agricultural regions of the country. In addition, Grão Direto will move forward with new partnerships in financial services, logistics and social and environmental compliance to make the lives of its users even more efficient when closing deals.

Users can make decisions in grain trading, by using data through Grão Direto’s digital solutions. In addition to more agility in processes associated with trading, the company gathers market information on its platform, which can be accessed from any device with internet connection. It offers international trading companies, agricultural cooperatives, brokers, feed mill factories, feedlots, elevators, and traders the ability to access information to trade grains in the platform.

Funding for the venture round included companies such as Lanx Capital, Bayer, Barn Investimentos, and Grupo Rendimento’s investment branch.

“This is certainly one of the most important groups of investment in technology in agribusiness in Latin America, turning up several relevant profiles to promote this revolution,” said Alexandre Borges, chief executive officer of Grão Direto. “We are immensely proud to combine excellent venture capital funds with large agricultural and financial market corporations, as well as executives with global experience.”

Currently, the company already works for two of the four largest grain trading companies in the world, in addition to hundreds of other purchasing companies, and within this new expansion, it is also at a later stage of the negotiation process with other giants in the sector and some regional buyers.

After launching in 2019 the first digital contract platform focused exclusively on grains, Grão Direto said the number of contracts grew nine times between February 2020 and May 2020, the period of the last summer harvest and already under the impacts of the pandemic.

“We are committed to giving more agility, safety and efficiency to producers, buyers and grain brokers every day,” Borges said. “The grain business is the big key to unlocking immense opportunities for farms. We will take advantage of the fact that thousands of businesses have settled a deal through Grão Direto to offer more and more easiness to our users.”

Grão Direto was founded in Uberaba, Minas Gerais, Brazil, by the entrepreneurs Pedro Paiva, Alexandre Borges e Frederico Marques. The company connects grain growers and grain buyers in a more efficient, safe and modern way.