French biocontrol startup Agriodor raises €15 million to scale aphid control
French startup Agriodor has raised €15 million to expand its olfactory biocontrol platform, including a sugar beet product that reduced green aphid pressure in field trials.
French startup Agriodor has raised €15 million in a funding round led by Crédit Mutuel Impact to expand its olfactory biocontrol platform. The Next Web reports that the Rennes-based company was founded in 2019 as a spin-off from INRAE, France's National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and Environment. The new capital is intended to help the business scale development, broaden market reach, and advance more products through regulation.
Agriodor's technology is built around blends of natural volatile organic compounds that manipulate how pest insects use smell. The company says roughly 80% of invasive insect pests rely on olfactory cues to find host plants for feeding, mating, and egg-laying. By identifying compounds that insects perceive as unattractive and reproducing them synthetically, Agriodor develops products that either repel pests or lure them into traps. The products are formulated as granules so they can be applied with standard field machinery.
Its lead product targets Myzus persicae, the green aphid that spreads yellowing disease in sugar beet. That crop lost a major line of chemical defense after neonicotinoids were banned across France and Europe, increasing interest in alternative control methods. Agriodor's repellent, marketed as INSIOR Gr A in partnership with Syngenta, received French regulatory authorization for field trials in March 2026.
Syngenta field trials in 2025 showed a 40% reduction in green aphid populations compared with untreated controls. According to the company, the product works through three mechanisms at once: it repels winged aphids responsible for colonizing fields, disrupts feeding behavior, and reduces reproductive activity by limiting energy intake. Before this new round, Agriodor had already raised about €8 million, with €5 million secured in May 2023 and a €3 million extension in February 2024.
The fresh financing is meant to support three additional products on new crops, wider coverage including tropical zones, and new global distribution partnerships. Agriodor is targeting the US and Brazilian markets in particular, where biocontrol approvals can take 18 to 24 months versus up to seven years in the EU. The company is led by co-founder and CEO Alain Thibault, while CTO Dr Ené Leppik provided the scientific foundation through earlier research at INRAE. The deal underlines how investment is continuing to flow into crop protection technologies that aim to replace banned insecticides without harming pollinators, soils, or human health.