Grosvenor’s Wheatsheaf Group, the international investor in Food & AgTech, is introducing a new partnership model to lead the organisation through its next phase of growth and development – this will also see Wheatsheaf being renamed as Grosvenor Food & AgTech from January 2022. 

Current Executive Directors Anthony James, Katrin Burt, Monty Bayer, Peter Kristensen and Stephan Dolezalek will lead the business as managing partners, taking decisions collectively in the best long-term interests of the business and its stakeholders – working with portfolio companies to support their growth and development, scaling up their reach and impact, while pursuing new investment opportunities. As part of the changes, Graham Ramsbottom, Wheatsheaf’s CEO, steps down from his post and will leave the organisation at the end of the year, following a process of transition. 

Created in 2012 to diversify the Grosvenor Estate’s activities beyond property and within a sector that offered the opportunity to make a meaningful, positive and lasting difference to society, Wheatsheaf has since grown its investments to build a portfolio of over 20 international companies. Working to rethink and re-shape how food is grown, produced, distributed and consumed, we partner with like-minded people to understand the complex interconnectedness of our agricultural ecosystem to manage its effects and enhance human health, our environment and enable producers to thrive. 

One of the largest and longest established investment teams in the sector, our investment approach adopts a far-sighted perspective with the aim of developing innovative business models and to harness the insights and power of technology to identify, develop and scale up lasting solutions. 

Mark Preston, Executive Trustee of the Grosvenor Estate, said: “By creating new and better places over the past 340 years, the Grosvenor name has become closely associated with world-class real estate. The creation of Wheatsheaf, its growth over the past 10 years and now our plans for its next phase of development under a new partnership model bear a similar ambition – to help create a better food system, one that is good for human health, the environment and producers. In doing so we are committed to deploying significant new capital to grow the business. In congratulating the managing partners on their new roles, I must express Grosvenor’s deepest thanks to Graham Ramsbottom. He was instrumental in the creation of Wheatsheaf, identifying and steering a clear course and purpose for the organisation in its embryonic early years. From that solid foundation he then built a team that has the breadth of skills and experience to make Wheatsheaf one of the leading investors in the Food and AgTech sector, with a portfolio that is widely admired.” 

Graham Ramsbottom said: “Joining Grosvenor in 2009 to identify and lead its diversification within a new area, I look back with a sense of pride on what we have achieved through our focus on Food and Agtech – a sector that has now become a favoured destination for climate focused global funding. Wheatsheaf is at the end of a chapter and about to embark on its next exciting phase of growth. It is a natural point for me to step aside and to pursue other opportunities in a sector that I am passionate about.”