Colin Steen: Venture Capital in Agriculture and the consolidation of Big Ag companies

About this episode

Colin Steen, a 25-year Syngenta veteran turned CEO of independent seed company Legacy Seed Companies, joins Vance for a wide-ranging tour of agricultural venture capital, corporate consolidation, and the organic-labeling black market. Steen explains how ag innovation is quietly happening "in the shadows" — AI-driven molecule screening companies like EnCo Chem compressing the traditional 14-year, $500M product-development pipeline, and epigenetics startups like Sound Ag "turning down the volume" on genes — even as 80% of seed and 60-70% of chemistry remains controlled by four majors. He walks through the mechanics and risks of SPACs as a shortcut around IPO scrutiny, then recounts living through Syngenta's acquisition by ChemChina from inside the company, drawing a striking parallel with Vance's own experience at Monsanto during the Bayer takeover (down to the dark-humor "seed guys get HR, chemistry guys get a job offer" hallway joke). The conversation's most substantive thread is organic and non-GMO agriculture's structural fraud problem: with only ~200,000 acres of organic corn grown domestically, Steen argues most "organic" corn, soy, and alfalfa reaching US ports and grocery shelves is laundered through Ukraine and Turkey, exploiting certification loopholes (farmers checking "unavailable in organic" boxes, or shipping conventional seed to Mexico where it becomes "organic" crossing back). Steen frames his own company's non-GMO alfalfa breeding program as filling a genuine supply gap — including alfalfa's unusual role as a three-year "transition crop" bridge into organic certification — while remaining skeptical that consumer demand is translating into real US organic acreage growth. The episode closes on climate change, where both agree the climate/carbon-tax debate has become too binary to be productive, and Steen worries that top-down carbon-credit incentives will produce perverse behavior (farmers restarting no-till clocks to capture new credits) rather than rewarding decades of quiet, already-sustainable practice.

“Companies like Enco Chem are using machine learning, like really deep tech machine learning, artificial intelligence to start to be able to get to screening chemistry and molecules better... we can do it all through AI and automation.”

“So basically, let's assume I'm worth like $400 billion and I've registered a SPAC... but there's nothing there. So basically my S-1 filing is just, it'll be a $4 billion company someday, but today there's no revenues, there's no cost, there's no nothing. It's just a shell.”

“If you're a chemistry guy on your resume, there'd be a room off to the left where you can go... and if you're a seed guy, they'd sort of pat you on the shoulder and thank you for your time and efforts. HR will be over here to talk to you later.”

Key moments

• ~12-17%: EnCo Chem/AI molecule screening and epigenetics (Sound Ag) as the real, largely invisible locus of ag innovation, versus consumer-facing SPAC hype.
• ~30-33%: Plain-English SPAC explainer and mutual suspicion of the vehicle's reduced regulatory scrutiny.
• ~33-40%: Living through corporate acquisition from inside — Syngenta/ChemChina and Monsanto/Bayer — including the "seed guys vs. chemistry guys" gallows-humor line and both companies' surprisingly smooth customer transitions.
• ~50-58%: Vance's candid admission that his core beliefs about GMOs "changed all the way down" after joining Monsanto, and Steen's "evolved not changed" reframing.
• ~62-68%: The organic/non-GMO laundering thesis — Ukraine/Turkey grain relabeled as organic at US ports, plus farmer-side certification loopholes (the "checked availability box" trick, Mexico seed laundering).
• ~78-85%: Alfalfa's unique agronomic role — nitrogen self-fixing, four-year perennial soil benefits, and its use as a three-year organic-transition "moat" crop.
• ~99%: Steen's climate-credit "perverse incentive" warning — no-till farmers restarting their clock to capture new carbon-credit payments, erasing prior sequestration gains.

Notable quotes

“Let's assume I'm worth like $400 billion and I've registered a SPAC... but there's nothing there. It's just a shell.”

“This stuff's coming from somewhere, and it is coming from Ukraine and Turkey... coming into our ports as organic corn and it's not.”

“If you're a chemistry guy on your resume, there'd be a room off to the left... if you're a seed guy, they'd pat you on the shoulder. HR will be over here to talk to you later.”

“The what I believe to be true all the way down at my core changed... that concept of where you stand on an issue is determined by where you sit.”