Harnessing the power of the microbiome to increase productivity, sustainability, and resilience in controlled-environment agriculture

Concert Bio is a start-up (UK SME) founded in 2021 by Dr Paul Rutten MBA (synthetic biologist; PhD in plant-microbe interactions from the University of Oxford; Entrepreneur First). We are developing a full-stack microbiome optimisation platform for controlled-environment agriculture (CEA) growers, which combines sequencing-based monitoring with environmental and probiotic interventions to maximise sustainable CEA crop production and minimise wasted operational costs through improving productivity, sustainability, and resilience.

Founded in 2013, GrowUp Farms (UK SME, now part of Vescor Group) is a leading CEA grower based in England. GrowUp Farms latest CEA farm, Pepperness (Sandwich, Kent), will start supplying salad greens to UK supermarket shelves from early 2023\.

With Innovate UK support, Concert Bio will develop a microbiome monitoring and optimisation service to improve productivity, sustainability, and resilience in CEA. Working with GrowUp Farms, Concert Bio will develop and validate the benefits of microbiome monitoring and optimisation, focusing initially on CEA lettuce. Successful project outcomes will bring significant benefits to CEA growers in England through increasing crop performance and sustainability