Ansā press photo.
Israeli coffee tech startup Ansā closed a US$9 million funding round to support the launch of its countertop roasting machine in North America.
According to Ansā (styled ansā by the company), the company’s core roasting machine is now market-ready following several years of product development, including pilots with office coffee users in the United States.
After launching during the pandemic period under the name Griin in late 2020, the company rebranded to Ansā in 2021 while also receiving a cash injection of $2 million from the New York-based investment firm Closed Loop Partners.
Leading this latest funding round is Tel Aviv, Israel-baed Jibe Ventures, with additional funding coming from Closed Loop, New Climate Ventures, Millennium Food-tech and Sweetwood.
“Our micro-roaster is ready-to-market. During 2023 we secured commercial contracts nationwide with a lineup of top-tier distributors eagerly anticipating launching the service in prominent locations such as Los Angeles, New York, Atlanta, Seattle, and more,” states Yuval Weisglass, co-founder and CEO of Ansā, said in an announcement of the new funding round. “We are committed to broadening our coffee services geographically to meet the growing demand for sustainable coffee solutions, and to bring our unique coffee concept to a wider audience.”
Since its inception, the core, electric-powered Ansā machine has been pitched primarily as an on-demand coffee roasting solution for offices, hotel lobbies, restaurants and other away-from-home environments.
The market-ready iteration of the roaster, called the e23, employs “dielectric heating,” a principle often associated with microwaves, as opposed to traditional methods involving drums for conduction and hot air for convection.
The Ansā e23 roasting machine with green coffee beans. 2021 DCN file photo, courtesy of Ansā.
With a hopper for green, unroasted coffee beans, the machine promises on-demand roasting for small batches of coffee within minutes. The machine is supported by Ansā’s in-house app as well as green coffee services.
The company says that the roasting machine is “quiet, smoke-free, and cool to the touch.” Ansā founders in 2021 told DCN that it was designed to be used in tandem with super-automatic coffee machines and other commercial brewing solutions, in order to provide a full green-coffee-to-cup solution.
“This fully automatic appliance is equipped with a myriad of sensors and computer vision AI algorithms to ensure a consistently even roast for preparing the perfect freshly brewed cup of coffee,” the company said in today’s announcement.
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Nick Brown
Nick Brown is the editor of Daily Coffee News by Roast Magazine.
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