CHF 150k · Other round · Agritech · Lausanne, Switzerland
Apolarion, an EPFL spin-out developing chemical-free seed treatment hardware, has received CHF 150k from Venture Kick. The award will fund its first field trials and initial customer deployments, including operational space, equipment and personnel for pilot programmes, according to the funding announcement.
Field trials turn plasma performance into a buying decision
The Lausanne-based company is building a modular device that generates cold atmospheric plasma from air and electricity. Those reactive particles are intended to remove harmful microorganisms from seed surfaces without chemical coatings or heat, while preserving germination. Apolarion is initially working with seed companies and research institutes on trials and pilot-line integration, its company website says.
The commercial test is therefore broader than whether plasma can kill a pathogen in a laboratory. Seed companies need crop-specific evidence that treatment remains reliable at useful throughput, fits existing processing workflows and does not compromise seed vigour. Funding the facilities, equipment and staff behind field trials gives Apolarion a way to produce that operating evidence with prospective customers rather than asking them to buy an unproven machine.
Apolarion has said it plans to begin with a service model instead of immediately selling hardware. That can lower the customer’s adoption burden while the startup learns how treatment settings vary across high-value vegetable seeds and organic growing applications. It also makes the pilots commercially useful: each engagement can inform the repeatable process, equipment configuration and economics needed before wider hardware deployment.
From an EPFL lab unit to customer pilots
Venture Kick previously awarded Apolarion CHF 40k in May 2026 to build an MVP and support business development. At that point, the founders said they had a laboratory testing unit, early letters of intent and a plan to move towards a commercially viable prototype. The new CHF 150k award is a separate step focused on field validation and first deployments, rather than a conventional equity round.
The company was co-founded by plasma physicists Jesús Poley-Sanjuán and Luke Simons and is supported by EPFL’s Swiss Plasma Center. Its next execution challenge is to translate the same treatment principle across different seed-pathogen pairs while keeping the service simple enough for processors to adopt. Success would give customers a route to reduce chemical inputs without replacing seed disease control with an energy-intensive heat process.
