Power Sustainable Lios believes companies that proactively elevate environmental and social issues, while engaging to develop solutions, will yield large opportunities for value creation.
Our current food system is facing an important challenge: feeding a growing population with limited and depleting resources. Key stakeholder groups, including consumers, employees, investors and governments, are expressing growing concerns about the current state of our food system and asking for sustainable change from organizations across the value chain. As the scrutiny on food and sustainability will only intensify, the impact will be far-reaching.
Investment focus
Power Sustainable Lios invest in mid-market companies across the food value chain in North America, working closely with entrepreneurs and operators in building a more resilient and sustainable food system. We invest across production, manufacturing and distribution/retail.
We support good people doing great things. To do so, our decisions are based on 4 key investment criteria:
- Investment thesis and corporate strategy contribute positively to environmental, economic and social factors.
- Established mid-market companies, based in North America, operating within the food value chain.
- Core elements of growth infrastructure in place and ready to scale.
- Opportunity for majority ownership or meaningful minority; ability to deploy a total of up to $25-50 million in support of growth, with flexibility to go higher in case of larger assets.
- Learn more on Power Sustainable Lios website
At a glance
- Offers deep and actionable set of opportunities to invest in underserved, growth-oriented companies who are positively transforming the $2.7 trillion North American agri-food value chain.
- Our team has invested more than $40 billion and worked directly in the agri-food business for a combined 29 years.
- Deep agri-food investing, operating, and strategy experience; our extensive network enables a differentiated investment, value creation, and talent sourcing capability.
Jonathan Belair
Managing Partner
Jonathan Belair is the Managing Partner of Power Sustainable Lios. He has 20 years of investing and operating experience, with a deep focus in food, agriculture, and sustainability. Prior to Power Sustainable Lios, Jonathan most recently spent 5 years as a senior executive at McCain Foods, a global food processing and agriculture company with C$10 billion in revenues. Throughout this period, Jonathan led global M&A, Strategy, and Venture Investing, as well as the Company’s Global Sustainability/ESG function. He has led investments across the food value chain, including in agriculture production, regenerative agriculture, vertical farming, plant-based protein, agriculture data analytics, food processing, and transportation. Prior to McCain Foods, Jonathan was a senior member of the direct private equity team at OMERS Private Equity (OMERS) where he was responsible for sourcing, executing, and managing direct private equity investments in North America. In addition, Jonathan participated on the board of directors of several portfolio companies and provided strategic and operational leadership to a number of investments. Prior to OMERS, Jonathan was part of the investment banking group at Scotiabank, where he was involved in mandates across industry groups, focused on mergers and acquisitions advisory, and equity and debt financings.
Craig Hanna
Partner
Craig Hanna is a Partner of Power Sustainable Lios. Craig brings over 15 years of investing, advisory, and operating experience to the firm, primarily within the food industry. His experience spans the food value-chain from regenerative and organic agriculture, specialty ingredients, food manufacturing, branded and private label CPG, brokerage/distribution, through to retail. Prior to Power Sustainable Lios, Craig founded and led Clearview Advisory, an agri-food focused mid-market advisory firm. In the 5 years since founding Clearview, Craig has served as a trusted advisor to privately-owned food businesses and private equity clients on matters of strategy, M&A, due diligence, and post-merger integration. Craig also held interim executive roles as CFO, VP Sales, and in general management at various food company clients. Prior to Clearview, Craig was a member of the senior leadership team for 5 years at SunOpta, a $1.5Bn global leader in plant-based foods and organic ingredients. During this tenure at SunOpta, he led Corporate Development, Strategy, and FP&A across North America and Europe. Craig led investments, integrations, and divestitures across multiple ingredient and food categories. In 2016, he was recognized as a Canadian Dealmaker of the Year by Lexpert, Deloitte, The Globe and Mail, and Thomson Reuters. Craig began his career in the Corporate Finance practice at PwC where he focused on M&A advisory and capital raising in the mid-market across a range of sectors, including agri-food. He actively supports the next generation of food and beverage entrepreneurs in Canada. He has been a mentor at the District Ventures CPG Accelerator since 2014, before joining the boards of District Venture Accelerator and District Ventures Kitchen non-profits in 2020. Since that time, these programs have helped launch more than 50 CPG companies.
James Rickert
Partner
James Rickert is a Partner of Power Sustainable Lios. He has over 15 years of transaction and asset management experience, with a deep track record in M&A, capital raising, and corporate governance. He spent 10 years at Brookfield Asset Management as a member of its infrastructure group, most recently as Managing Partner and head of strategic initiatives and chief legal officer. During his time at Brookfield, James played central roles in investments across various infrastructure sectors, including transportation, energy, utilities, and data infrastructure. He co-led infrastructure co-investment initiatives, working with some of Brookfield’s largest institutional partners on its most significant transactions. In total, James was directly involved in over US$30 billion of transaction activity during a time when Brookfield Infrastructure’s assets under management grew to exceed US$90B. He began his career at Goodmans LLP, where he maintained a corporate practice focused on M&A, private equity, and capital markets transactions. Prior to Power Sustainable Lios, he joined Hakluyt & Company, a global strategic advisory firm, to help expand its presence in Canada. James’ community involvement includes serving as an advisor to NEXT Canada, as a member of the Fundraising Cabinet for the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Toronto, and as a member of the inaugural board of directors of the Toronto Foundation for Youth Involvement in Politics.
