Investors at Milken Focus on Food as the Public’s Eating Habits Change

Food is becoming an increasing focus for institutional investors and family offices, executives said Monday at the Milken Institute Global Conference in Beverly Hills, California. Jeffrey Housenbold, managing partner at SoftBank Vision Fund, which counts Brandless, Plenty and DoorDash among its food-related investments:SoftBank’s minimum investment size is $100 million and the firm is looking for companies that need capital for R&D and to create infrastructure to distribute globally, among other things.The firm seeks to provide “patient capital” and isn’t worried about near-term profitability.SoftBank is interested in “use of data” across all investments, such as how it informs a company’s go-to-market or customer-acquisition strategies.