Norwich, UK – Tropic, a pioneering tropical seeds company, has made a significant move in the agricultural industry with its acquisition of Rahan Meristem. This leading international banana plant propagation company has a strong presence across Latin America, Asia, and the Middle East, making it a valuable addition to Tropic’s portfolio.
The acquisition provides Tropic with large-scale plant production and distribution capacity in the world’s major banana-exporting regions. This will accelerate the commercial rollout of its next-generation banana varieties and establish the first fully integrated banana genetics company, spanning variety development, propagation, and grower supply.
Bananas are one of the world’s most important agricultural crops, with more than 20 million tonnes exported annually. However, global commercial production is heavily reliant on a single variety, the Cavendish, which leaves growers vulnerable to disease pressure, supply-chain disruptions, and major threats such as Panama disease TR4.
To address these challenges, Tropic has developed improved banana varieties using advanced gene-editing and breeding technologies. These varieties retain the agronomic performance and consumer qualities of Cavendish bananas while introducing valuable new traits, including disease resistance, reduced browning, extended shelf life, and higher yields. This not only helps growers improve productivity and resilience but also delivers better-quality fruit and reduces waste across the supply chain.
With a recent $105 million Series C funding round and the launch of the first commercially viable new banana varieties in over 75 years, Tropic is now focused on scaling up global production and grower adoption. The acquisition of Rahan Meristem provides the necessary propagation capacity, operational expertise, and regional presence to accelerate commercial deployment worldwide. This marks Tropic’s evolution to an integrated seeds company servicing growers in one of the largest and most important crops globally.
By combining Tropic’s gene-editing pipeline with Rahan’s large-scale propagation expertise and established grower relationships, the company is creating an integrated platform capable of developing, propagating, and distributing improved banana varieties at commercial scale. Rahan’s existing grower relationships across the major banana-producing regions provide direct routes to market for Tropic’s new varieties.
Gilad Gershon, CEO of Tropic, expressed excitement about the acquisition, stating, “Welcoming Rahan and its team into Tropic creates a remarkable joint business with the operational scale and global reach to deliver critical banana innovations to growers worldwide. Together, we can help growers improve resilience and productivity while delivering better-quality fruit and reduced waste for consumers and supply chains.”
Tropic, founded in 2016 and headquartered in Norwich, UK, has operations across Asia and Latin America and employs around 160 people globally. Its core crop portfolio focuses on bananas and rice, and it also partners with global commercial players to license its proprietary GEiGS® platform across a wider range of crops.
Using GEiGS® and other advanced gene-editing technologies, Tropic develops improved crops with traits such as disease resistance, higher yields, and reduced browning, addressing major agricultural challenges and delivering benefits for growers, consumers, and the environment.
In 2025, Tropic closed an oversubscribed $105 million Series C financing round to accelerate the global commercial scale-up of its banana and rice portfolios and advance its pipeline of climate-resilient crops. The round was co-led by Forbion and Corteva, with participation from Just Climate and IQ Capital, alongside new investors ABN Amro and Invest International, and existing investors including Temasek, Five Seasons Ventures, Sucden Ventures, Genoa Ventures, and Polaris Partners.
Founded in 1974, Rahan Meristem has grown to become one of the world’s most established international banana propagation businesses. With production facilities in Costa Rica, Colombia, Ecuador, Israel, and the Philippines and a team of over 200 professionals, the company supplies growers across the major banana-producing regions. Its scale, technical expertise, and long-standing grower relationships make it a natural complement to Tropic’s genetics platform.
