Levubu Root Business Plan — Implementation Roadmap
The phases from 20 hectares to 88, seed block build-out, and the gate at each stage.
Implementation Roadmap
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- Overview & contents
- 1. Executive Summary
- 2. Investment Thesis
- 3. Company and Business Overview
- 4. Problem, Customer Need and Value Proposition
- 5. Products and Services
- 6. Industry Analysis
- 7. Market Analysis and Sizing
- 8. Customer Analysis
- 9. Competitive Landscape
- 10. Business Model
- 11. Go-to-Market Strategy
- 12. Operating Model
- 13. Management and Organisation
- 14. Strategic Plan
- 15. SWOT Analysis
- 16. Risk Analysis
- 17. ESG and Sustainability
- 18. Implementation Roadmap
- 19. Financial Plan
- 20. Assumptions Framework
- 21. Funding Requirement and Structure
- 22. Break-Even and Debt Serviceability
- 23. Investment Case and Valuation
- 24. Sensitivity and Scenario Analysis
- 25. Key Performance Indicators and Management Dashboard
- 26. Conclusion
- A. Appendix A: Assumption Register
- B. Appendix B: Conditions Precedent to Drawdown
- C. Appendix C: Index of Exhibits and Tables
- D. Appendix D: Glossary
- 18.1 Forty-eight month roadmap
- 18.2 Phases, milestones and dependencies
- 18.3 The critical path, stated as a decision sequence
- 18.4 Milestone gates for Tranche B
The roadmap runs 48 months from the date of the equity subscription agreement. The dominant scheduling constraint is that the planting window is fixed by the season and cannot be moved. Every activity before the first planting is therefore on the critical path in a way that would not be true in a business where the start date is flexible.
18.1 Forty-eight month roadmap
18.2 Phases, milestones and dependencies
|
Phase |
Months |
Milestones |
Dependencies and critical path |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Pre-launch |
M0 – M5 |
Soil and land history screening complete; leases executed on the first rotation footprint; water entitlements verified; Managing Director and Head of Plant Health appointed; first planting material procured; Tranche A of R24.0m drawn. |
This is the critical path. Screening must precede lease execution, lease execution must precede irrigation, and planting material must be secured before the November window. A four-week slip here costs a full season, not four weeks. |
|
Launch |
M5 – M13 |
Irrigation installed on blocks one to three; packhouse and cold store constructed; clean seed facility and laboratory commissioned; 28 hectares planted in November and December; first retail programme negotiations opened. |
Packhouse construction runs eight months and must complete before the July harvest. It cannot be compressed and cannot be commissioned during a harvest window, which is why it starts before the first crop is in the ground. |
|
Ramp-up |
M13 – M27 |
First harvest and pack season completed; seed block indexed and certified; R12.0m Tranche B drawn against milestones; 46 hectares planted; food safety certification achieved. |
Tranche B is conditional on the first season’s agronomic result. Certification is a precondition of retail programme supply and must precede the second harvest, not follow it. |
|
Scale-up |
M27 – M39 |
66 hectares planted; second packhouse line and cold store extension commissioned; seed rhizome channel opened to third-party growers; second term debt tranche of R5.0m drawn. |
Packhouse capacity must lead the crop by one season. Seed sales depend on two seasons of indexing records, which is why the channel opens in FY2029 and not earlier. |
|
Expansion |
M36 – M48 |
Second production district established; 88 hectares planted in the core district; seasonal facility increased to R30.0m. |
District two requires its own screening and lease cycle, run in parallel from M36. It is the only workstream that can slip a season without breaking the plan. |
Table 41. Implementation phases with milestones and the dependencies that define the critical path.
18.3 The critical path, stated as a decision sequence
18.4 Milestone gates for Tranche B
Tranche B of R12.0m is subscribed at a pre-money valuation of R52.0m and is conditional on four milestones measured at the close of FY2027:
- Yield of not less than 24 tonnes a hectare on the harvested commercial area, against 26 assumed.
- Crop loss to soil-borne disease of not more than 15% of planted area, against 12% assumed.
- Seed block indexed clean and sufficient to plant the FY2028 area of 46 hectares.
- Marketable share of not less than 84% of harvested weight through the company’s own packhouse, against 88% assumed.
Each gate is set below the plan assumption, deliberately. The purpose of the gates is not to reward outperformance; it is to stop the second cheque if the agronomy has not worked. An investor who cannot walk away at that point is funding the whole thesis on the strength of a projection, and a management team that cannot meet gates set below its own plan should expect the question.