In the year since Mondelez launched SnackFutures Ventures, the corporate venture arm of the sweets and snacks giant made multiple investments that may appear disparate at first blush, but which serve as a roadmap for navigating some of the most significant challenges and opportunities facing the snack industry.
Among the notable investments are minority stakes in the cocoa-tech startup Celleste Bio and better-for-you doughnut start-up Urban Legend – which help round out a portfolio including the premium chocolate brand Hu and the crispy arepa maker Craize Snacks.
These investments shine a light on how Mondelez foresees the evolution of snacking, including the types of products and attributes consumers will want, how or when they will “snack” and what it will take to meet their demands from the perspective of supply chain security, cost management and potential partnerships or acquisitions.
The evolution of Snackfutures
The current rendition of SnackFutures is a far cry from its original position as an innovation and venture hub when it launched in 2018 – but while its approach has evolved, its core mission remains the same: to push the boundaries of what is possible in snacking.
A year ago, Mondelez phased out SnackFutures’ innovation hub and CoLab Program, which sought to accelerate innovative startups that could take the larger business into new areas, and in its stead debuted SnackFutures Ventures as a corporate VC with a tighter focus on accelerating innovation that supports Mondelez’s core businesses in chocolate, biscuits and baked snacks.
“We decided to kind of pause on the new-to-the-world innovation work that has been in done in SnackFutures and really focus much more on investing in the innovators that are there that can disrupt snacking in the future,” explained Richie Gray, global head of SnackFutures Ventures.
This model allows SnackFutures to support innovators while staying out of their way so they can “do what they’re good at, which is inventing,” he added.
Future-proofing snacking
In the year since SnackFutures Ventures launched, it has made only four investments, but they all promise to turn challenges facing the snack industry into opportunities for Mondelez.
“We are very selective because we play a highly strategic role for the company. We are not like a financial venture capital fund that makes a number of bets to see how things play out to make a short term financial return,” Gray said. “We are really investing in opportunities that we see can be highly strategic for us” with the ultimate goal of one day “hopefully” incorporating them fully into the Mondelez portfolio.
Among the deals was a follow-on investment in the cocoa-tech startup Cellest Bio, which could alleviate supply challenges constraining cocoa.
“Thirty percent of our business globally is chocolate, so cocoa, which is the key ingredient going into chocolate, is such an important commodity for us. Clearly, at the moment, the price of cocoa is at an extreme high. But even prior to that, we recognized that an ingredient as important as cocoa, which faces other challenges in the supply chain, we needed to be taking the necessary steps to make sure we can guarantee the long-term supply of cocoa to keep making our great chocolate products and keeping our customers happy,” Gray said.
Celleste Bio could hold a key to safeguarding the supply of cocoa ingredients with its cell-cultured technology that could soon produce the same amount of cocoa butter from just one or two beans as traditional methods currently produce from four tons of cocoa pods.
SnackFutures Ventures’ investment last fall in the better-for-you doughnut startup Urban Legend addresses another potential threat to more decadent snacking occasions, such as sweet baked goods.
Mondelez has bullishly been building out its cakes and pastry business as a complement to its biscuits business, but increasingly consumers want products with lower-sugar, -fat and -calories, which is where Urban Legend comes into the equation.
“These guys have cracked something that we’ve never seen anyone able to crack before, which is to be able to deliver incredible tasting fresh bakery products, in this case doughnuts, with nutritionals that offer a big advantage against their main competitors,” Gray said.
For example, he said, Urban Legend’s doughnuts are a third of the calories of their close competitors.
“Consumers are snacking more – clearly. They want to snack better. They pay closer attention to labels, but they do want to treat themselves as well. So, if you can treat yourself and have something that has amazing taste but is also better for you than the previous alternative, then consumers will go for that. This really does meet a trend that consumers are looking for,” he added.
What is SnackFutures looking for next?
Even though SnackFutures is “choiceful” in its deals, Gray said it is looking for additional brands and technologies in which to invest.
Watch the full interview in the video to learn more about what SnackFutures seeks and the types of entrepreneurs, businesses and brands on which it is more likely to bet.
– Videography, production and editing by Caroline Rude
Join FoodNavigator in Chicago in June
Richie Gray, global head of SnackFutures Ventures at Mondelēz International will be joining a panel on Building Collaborative Success: Partnership Models Driving Breakthroughs in Food at Future Food-Tech in Chicago on June 3, 2025. Join him and 400 industry leaders – global founders, investors, CPGs and food brands – on June 2-3 to identify breakthrough opportunities to bridge supply chain gaps, commercialize alternative ingredients and advance protein diversification.
