Category: Cell-Based News

June 19, 2024

Future Food Quick Bites: Cinnamon Miyoko’s, Vegan Euro 2024 & Fighting Florida

5 Mins Read
In our weekly column, we round up the latest news and developments in the alternative protein and sustainable food industry. This week, Future Food Quick Bites covers Upside Foods’ cultivated meat tasting in Florida, a fermented sweetener from upcycled fruits, and Impossible Foods’ patent dispute with Motif FoodWorks.

New products and launches

Californian cultivated meat giant Upside Foods is fighting back against Florida’s ban on these novel proteins with a public tasting event in Miami on June 27, four days before the law comes into effect.

Courtesy: Upside Foods

It has been a big week for Californian precision-fermented egg producer The Every Company. After forming the Fermy brand with Landish Foods for beverage mixes, it announced a partnership with Spain’s Grupo Palacios, which will incorporate the animal-free egg in its Spanish omelettes.

More news from California: nut-free spread maker Voyage Foods‘ peanut and hazelnut butter innovations are now available in bulk sizes on Amazon to support the needs of foodservice operators.

Plant-based dairy pioneer Miyoko’s Creamery has launched two new versions of its oat milk butter in Garlic Parm and Cinnamon Brown Sugar flavours, which are priced at $4.99 per 6oz tub at Whole Foods.

Courtesy: Miyoko’s Creamery

Dutch plant-based ingredient company Fooditive Group has introduced a low-calorie, sustainable sugar substitute called Keto-Fructose in the US. It’s made from upcycled apples and pears via a fermentation process, which is now undergoing FDA GRAS assessment.

In the Netherlands itself, retail giant Jumbo has replaced gelatin with plant-based alternatives in all its fresh pastries. The renewed lineup is now available at all 700 locations in the Netherlands and Belgium.

In search for plant-based M&M’s? UK vegan chocolatier Mummy Meegz has rolled out dairy-free M’z Gems in chocolate and peanut flavours, joining its range of alternatives to classics like Cadbury’s Creme Eggs and Freddo bars.

Courtesy: Mummy Meegz

Swiss plant-based meat company Planted has entered the foodservice market in the Middle East, with its products being featured on menus of certain UAE restaurants. It now plans to expand into hotels.

German ingredients firm Loryma has introduced Lory Bind, a wheat-based binder intended as a clean-label alternative to methylcellulose in plant-based meat formulations.

Fellow German company Billie Green has debuted a plant-based mortadella range in classic, garden herb, and cherry pepper flavours.

Courtesy: Billie Green

And in Singapore, oat milk startup Oatside has expanded its ready-to-drink coffee line with Caramel Macchiato and Mocha flavours, which will be available at NTUC FairPrice, Don Don Donki, Shopee and other retailers from Friday at S$1.80 per pack.

Finance and company updates

Canadian plant-based producer Phytokana Ingredients has announced that it’s initiating a C$38M ($27.7M) Series C investment round, just as it introduced a new 70% faba bean protein concentrate that provides emulsification and gelling properties to vegan meat formulations.

Australian plant-based startup The Leaf Protein Co has brought in $850,000 in pre-seed funding to develop nutritional additives for food applications with rubisco protein.

Courtesy: The Leaf Protein Co

Mycoprotein giant Quorn has added egg white to the three new flavours of its previously vegan Sweet Chilli Mini Fillets, with no plant-based variants of the snack available.

Fellow mycoprotein player Mycorena, meanwhile, has discontinued its large-scale factory project for one of its core ingredients to focus on a long-term circular upcycling production model, citing an “unfavourable investment climate” and an unsuccessful Series B fundraising effort.

Israeli cultivated meat producer Believer Meats has signed an MoU with Abu Dhabi’s brand-new AgriFood Growth and Water Abundance cluster to establish research opportunities, pursue regulatory advancements, and explore commercial facilities.

Courtesy: Believer Meats

Global investor network FAIRR and Tufts University have released a Protein and Nutrition Factsheet for investors to gain more knowledge about sustainable nutrition, the scientific evidence of the health impacts of different proteins, and the risks and opportunities involved with the protein supply chain.

Also at Tufts University, the Center for Cellular Agriculture has received an “unprecedented investment” from the institute to hire five new dedicated cellular agriculture professors.

Policy and event news

Impossible Foods has been dealt a blow in its legal battle with Motif FoodWorks over precision-fermented heme proteins. The US Patent and Trademark Appeal Board has invalidated one of the former’s patents, which covers a plant-based “ground beef-like food product” that “results in the production of at least two volatile compounds which have a beef-associated aroma” when cooked.

In Spain, a coalition of over 20 seafood producers is accusing plant-based seafood companies of misleading consumers via their product labelling. The companies, which include Apromar, Interfish and Conxemar, intend to join SAFE Food Advocacy Europe to lobby for stricter regulations on vegan seafood, citing “unfair competition”.

UK biotech firm Sun Bear Biofuture has announced that its precision-fermented alternative to palm oil is safe to eat, with independent research showing its product outperforming conventional palm oil on flavour.

Courtesy: FoodHack

Italian cocoa-free chocolate maker Foreverland won the inaugural FoodTech World Cup at the HackSummit in Lausanne last week, beating out eight other finalists.

German food trade show Anuga has announced a new event for alternative proteins in 2025. Called Anuga Alternatives, it will feature cultivated, plant-based and fermentation-derived proteins, alongside ingredients like algae, mushrooms and insects.

Israeli alternative protein companies Imagindairy and Wanda Fish have been selected as the 2024 Global Technology Pioneers by the World Economic Forum.

Finally, UK plant-based meat startup THIS has partnered with former England footballer John Barnes, to release THIS Is The One, a new parody track for Euro 2024, which features vegan food at stadiums across Germany.

Check out last week’s Future Food Quick Bites.

The post Future Food Quick Bites: Cinnamon Miyoko’s, Vegan Euro 2024 & Fighting Florida appeared first on Green Queen.

This post was originally published on Green Queen.
June 12, 2024

Future Food Quick Bites: DoD v Cattlemen, Non-Dairy Footballers & Vegan in the Bronx

6 Mins Read
In our weekly column, we round up the latest news and developments in the alternative protein and sustainable food industry. This week, Future Food Quick Bites covers Alpro’s collaboration with Peter Crouch, a new alternative protein jobs platform, and a host of university-related news.

New products and launches

In the UK, Alpro has partnered with Peter Crouch to kickstart its new Alpro Plant Protein Morning Trials campaign. The former England footballer tests celeb fitness routines, including waking up at 2:30 AM, multiple gym sessions, and plunging into ice baths to promote the recently extended Plant Protein range.

Courtesy: Alpro

Also in the UK, there’s a new musical about the meat industry. Mad Cow will be coming to Canterbury’s new fully vegan Garlinge Theater next month.

Swiss meat analogues maker Planted has rolled out its fermentation-derived steak in Switzerland at Coop and in Germany at Rewe stores.

Belgian startup Bolder Foods is continuing to showcase its biomass-fermented cheese prototypes, with investors and entrepreneurs getting a taste of its product at an event hosted by ingredients leader Givaudan.

Courtesy: Ilana Taub/LinkedIn

San Francisco-based startup Impact Food has announced its sushi-grade plant-based salmon, with wholesale pre-orders running now. The product premiered at Oisixs Ra Daichi’s annual World Oceans Day event in sashimi and nigiri formats in Japan.

That’s not all for vegan salmon this week – German alt-seafood producer BettaF!sh has also entered the space with SAL-NOM, a hot smoked salmon analogue made from seaweed. It retails for €3.29 per 130g jar, and will be launched as a tinned SKU too in the summer.

As part of its roster of new mini-campaigns, Veganuary ran its Choose Fish-Free Week from June 3-8, shedding light on alternative seafood brands and recipes. A BBQ Month and Choose Dairy-Free Week will be next.

Courtesy: Veganuary

Israeli 3D-printed meat producer Redefine Meat has rolled out its New Meat range of lamb kofta mix, pulled beef, pulled pork, burgers, beef mince and bratwurst in German retail via e-tailer Velivery.

Hybrid meat maker Mush Foods has partnered with French specialty meat purveyor Dufour Gourmet to introduce a charcuterie range made from its 50Cut mycelium meat. Offerings include a bratwurst, breakfast sausage, Italian-style sausage, and chicken sausage.

Californian food tech company MeliBio‘s vegan honey, which retails in some parts of Europe under the Better Foodie brand name, is now available in Switzerland and Liechtenstein through a distribution deal with Swiss wholesaler Honeydew.

Courtesy: Better Foodie

Fellow Californian startup Upside Foods served its cultivated chicken at Industry Only LA, as part of buffalo chicken bao buns and cold sesame noodles.

In the US, catering giant Sodexo and the University of Cincinnati have introduced 513 Culinary Group, an immersive campus dining venture to spotlight inclusivity and local ingredients. The partnership entails new menu options with more plant-based foods and special care given to allergens.

If you’re in New York, the Fordham Plaza is hosting the Bronx Vegan Bazaar every third Saturday from noon to 6 PM starting this weekend on June 15.

Courtesy: Stella Artois

The Roots drummer Questlove partnered with Stella Artois to host the Questlove’s Cheesesteak Diner pop-up, which features Impossible Foods’ beef. It was the first event of the beer brand’s Let’s Do Dinner: Summer Series, which brings together food, lifestyle and entertainment platforms.

Speaking of which, Impossible Foods‘ new beef hot dog has made its way into Safeway stores in California and Jewel-Osco locations in Chicago – and it’s gone straight into the meat aisle.

Courtesy: Jake Berber/LinkedIn

And Singaporean beanless coffee startup Prefer has moved into the frozen world with a gelato launched in partnership with local dessert parlour Aphrodite Waffles and Gelato. The ice cream uses Prefer’s bean-free coffee concentrate.

Finance and company updates

Accelerator programme ProVeg Incubator has announced its latest cohort of alternative protein startups, featuring Atlantic Fish Co, Optimised Foods, Friends & Family Pet Food Company (all US), AIProtein (Egypt/US), and Fisheroo (Singapore). The initiative has also been extended from 12 weeks to 20.

Danish startup EvodiaBio has raised €7M to produce natural aromas for the food industry using precision fermentation. Its tech can improve the taste of non-alcoholic beer by producing yeast-derived ingredients that recreate the taste of hops.

Courtesy: The Better Meat Co

Fellow fermentation company The Better Meat Co has slashed the production costs of its mycoprotein, which is now on par with commodity beef when manufactured at scale.

Germany’s Veganz Group – which makes plant-based dairy, meat and snack products – has confirmed the drawdown of a grant from the State of Brandenburg’s investment bank to construct a new facility in Ludwigsfelde.

Fellow German company Tälist has introduced AltProtein.Jobs, an AI-led ‘matchmaking’ platform to connect employers with prospective candidates in the future food sector. Its algorithm has made 2,000 matches with a 9+ score, 9,400 with 8+, and 25,000 with a 7+ rating.

Courtesy: Tälist/Green Queen

The US Department of Defense has released a call for alternative protein funding proposals under BioMade, the public-private biomanufacturing consortium, with projects receiving between $500,000 to $2M. One of its key focus areas is on fermentation-derived and cultivated proteins for military rations. It has already spawned an outraged response from a cattle association.

Research and policy developments

Researchers at the United Arab Emirates University and the National University of Singapore have teamed up to explore novel plant protein sources that can be incorporated into meat analogues for better taste, texture and nutritional attributes.

In the US, Western Oregon University has signed the Humane Society of the United States‘ Forward Food Pledge, committing to transition its campus dining menus to 50% plant-based meals by 2027.

Courtesy: Nottingham Trent University

In more university news, the UK’s Nottingham Trent University has launched a master’s degree in smart agriculture, which will explore how AI, vertical farming and precision agriculture can enhance food security and reduce energy costs. Students will develop ‘recipes’ to produce food crops much more rapidly than currently possible outdoors.

Finally, plant-based food company Strong Roots conducted a 1,000-person survey in the US, the UK and Ireland to find that 52% of consumers are more likely to purchase products with carbon footprints on their packaging, and 82% want to be informed about businesses that contribute to climate change.

Check out last week’s Future Food Quick Bites.

The post Future Food Quick Bites: DoD v Cattlemen, Non-Dairy Footballers & Vegan in the Bronx appeared first on Green Queen.

This post was originally published on Green Queen.
June 11, 2024

Hybrid Meat Startup SciFi Foods Shuts Down Amid Fundraising Challenges

5 Mins Read
US hybrid meat startup SciFi Foods has appointed an advisory firm to sell its assets as cultivated meat continues to face a bleak investment landscape.

San Francisco-based startup SciFi Foods, the maker of hybrid meat from cultivated beef cells and plant-based ingredients, is shutting down its operations.

The news comes months after the company successfully completed its first commercial-scale production run in a 500-litre bioreactor. It had also been in consultation with the FDA over its regulatory approval path in the US.

“Given challenges in the fundraising market, we’ve appointed an advisory firm to run a sale process,” co-founder and CEO Joshua March told AgFunderNews.

“Given the nature of the process, I can’t really say much more beyond this,” he added.

SciFi Foods had achieved price parity with conventional beef

SciFi Foods founders Joshua March and Kasia Gora | Courtesy: SciFi Foods

Founded in 2019 as Artemys Foods, the startup rebranded in 2022 with a cultivated beef product to be used in hybrid meat formulations. Backed by Silicon Valley VC Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and other investors like Coldplay, SciFi Foods has brought in over $40M in total financing.

Hybrid meat, which combines cultivated proteins with plant-based ingredients, is aimed at enabling scalability and driving down the high costs of cultivated meat. Investors say this is the only way it is currently commercially viable – Eat Just, the first company to ever sell cultivated meat, has previously rolled out versions with about 60-70% of cultivated cells, and its latest innovation is a retail offering with 3% of chicken cells.

Startups like Aleph Farms, Meatable and Vital Meat – which are all expecting regulatory approval in various markets over the next few months – are also using the hybrid approach for their products. Aleph Farms, which received the go-ahead from the health ministry in Israel in January, will soon roll out its hybrid beef at restaurants in the country.

Late last year, SciFi Foods opened a 16,000 sq ft pilot facility in San Leandro, California, where it began growing beef cell lines in single-cell suspension, in a 100% serum-free process. This is where it had finished its first run in the 500-litre bioreactor.

Single-cell suspension allows cells to be grown in any standard, stirred-tank bioreactor, without the need to try and scale up novel hardware. It also does away with the need for expensive substrates like microcarriers or scaffolding, which is crucial for cost control.

SciFi Foods, whose hybrid burger was a 90/10 mix of a soy protein base and cultivated beef, announced that it had achieved price parity with conventional beef using a combination of its proprietary high-throughput cell line engineering and CRISPR technology in 2022.

Cultivated meat feels the heat

Courtesy: GFI

The development comes amid what has been a highly turbulent time for the cultivated meat industry. As March alluded to, fundraising has been a mountain to climb – according to the Good Food Institute (GFI), investment in cultivated meat companies nosedived by 75% from 2022 to 2023. This came amid a wider decline in food tech funding (-61%), with alternative protein financing dropping by 44% to $1.6B.

The loss of faith among VCs has continued for cultivated meat startups this year, with Q1 witnessing merely 5% of the $226M invested in the sector in all of 2023. It’s why AgFunder has earmarked cultivated meat as a “category to watch” this year.

It has become a major headache for companies in this sector. Just last week, Aleph Farms confirmed it had laid off 30% of its local staff in Israel due to difficulties in securing capital amid its scale-up process, and as part of its asset-light growth strategy. Californian cultivated seafood producer Finless Foods had similarly carried out two rounds of layoffs in less than 12 months.

Also in California, cultivated pork startup New Age Eats ceased operations in March 2023. Eat Just, based in San Francisco, has been caught up in a lawsuit against its former contract manufacturer ABEC, which has claimed over $100M in payments for changes to the scope of the work and unpaid bills in relation to its cultivated chicken arm Good Meat. A judge has sided with both entities in several matters, and the case will now proceed to trial.

Courtesy: Eat Just

Another Californian startup, Los Angeles-based Omeat, has had its workforce cut by 80%, with its founder stepping down as CEO amid allegations of creating a hostile work culture.

Apart from the financial headwinds, the industry has also been met with legislative challenges. Italy became the first country to ban the production and sale of cultivated meat last year, with France and Romania contemplating the same. And last month, the US states of Florida and Alabama both passed similar bills, which were heavily criticised even by the meat industry.

Company closures were predicted to continue this year by alternative protein experts, and SciFi Foods has become the latest on that list. “We are in a phase of consolidation and correction that isn’t over yet. Given that venture capital is so scarce, fundraising and due diligence processes are taking extremely long, and especially lead investors are so hard to find, we expect to see more businesses going down,” Albrecht Wolfmeyer, director of ProVeg Incubator, told Green Queen in April.

He added: “At the same time, we are seeing a lot of exciting innovation in the ecosystem and also growing consumer and corporate interest in markets like Germany. This and parts of next year will be tough, then we’ll see more light at the end of the tunnel.”

The post Hybrid Meat Startup SciFi Foods Shuts Down Amid Fundraising Challenges appeared first on Green Queen.

This post was originally published on Green Queen.
June 7, 2024

State of Global Policy: Canada Leads Investment in Alt-Proteins, Asia a Region to Watch

6 Mins Read
Canada and the EU lead the way in terms of public funding for alternative proteins, while Asia is a region to watch for this year, shows to a new policy-centric report.

Governments are investing more capital and implementing more supportive policies for alternative proteins as they recognise their potential as a solution to climate change, food security, public health, and employment – but they still have “plenty of ground to cover”, according to a new report.

Published by industry think tank the Good Food Institute (GFI), the State of Global Policy presents a snapshot of governments’ views on alternative protein across the planet in 2023. Its analysis estimates that public funding in the sector reached $523M last year, though this represented a 12.6% decline from the $599M poured into the industry in 2022.

Breaking this down further, $190M of this figure went to R&D, and another $163M was earmarked for commercialisation efforts. The remaining $170M was for mixed purposes. As for which alternative protein was most popular, it was a close call between plant-based ($189M) and fermentation-derived ($181M) innovations. Cultivated meat trailed behind with just $40M in government investments, while $112M was set aside for a combination of these proteins.

That said, GFI outlined that countries need to invest $10.1B annually for the industry to realise its full potential – this marks a nearly 30-fold increase from the actual investments that were disbursed in 2023 ($348M). But it’s just a fraction of the world’s spending on EVs, renewable energy and other climate-friendly technologies.

“By making public investments on par with other strategic priorities, policymakers can greatly accelerate the pace and scale of protein innovation and position their governments as leaders in a future industry,” the report states.

Here are the countries championing alternative proteins across different segments.

Who were the stars of 2023?

Courtesy: Ivy Farm Technologies

The report picks out Germany and the UK as the stars of 2023 for their dramatic increase in spending on alternative proteins. The former surpassed its all-time funding into alternative proteins ($35M) with $44M in investment last year. The country is investing up to $20.4M in alternative proteins between 2023 and 2028, which includes a $547,000 grant to Kynda, as well as a new research project for cultivated seafood.

Germany has also set aside €38M ($41.3M) in its federal budget for 2024 to develop alternative protein production capacity and help farmers transition to plant-based agriculture. And in March this year, it adopted a national nutrition strategy recommending that plant-based foods should make up at least 75% of people’s diets.

The UK, meanwhile, announced a $15.3M cellular agriculture research hub, funded over 20 research projects, and included cultivated meat and fermentation in a $2.2B national biotechnology plan. It also received its first two cultivated meat applications from Aleph Farms and Ivy Farm Technologies in 2023 (followed by Vital Meat last month), and is now overhauling its pre-Brexit regulations to clear the path for novel food companies. Cultivated pet food company Meatly is expecting the greenlight and a market launch imminently.

The public investment leaders

Courtesy: New School Foods

While the UK and Germany may be becoming major players, their investment is far eclipsed by a few others. Canada tops the charts with $129M invested in alternative proteins in 2023 (versus $174M in all-time funding before the year). This is largely thanks to the allocation of $112M from Protein Industries Canada, a public-private partnership for novel proteins and one of the country’s economic clusters.

It was followed by the EU ($113M) and the US ($82M). Before 2023, Denmark was the leader on this list, investing a total of $223M in the sector – but it fell off last year, with just $891,000 in alternative protein financing.

The regulatory winners

Courtesy: UPSIDE Foods/Eat JUST

Singapore has always been a flagbearer of progressive regulation when it comes to alternative proteins, but last year, the US joined it as the only other country to approve the sale of cultivated meat, with Eat Just’s Good Meat and Upside Foods both launching their cultivated chicken products in restaurants.

The two countries had already given the go-ahead to precision fermentation company Remilk for its recombinant whey proteins, and its home country Israel joined that list, granting approval in April. Israel also became the third country to clear cultivated meat for sale at the start of this year. And Singapore followed its 2020 approval of Good Meat by giving the greenlight to Australia’s Vow.

The plant-based pioneers

Courtesy: Umiami

GFI pinpointed three countries championing plant-based proteins by boosting local agriculture and manufacturing. Australia, which rescinded a grant for pulse protein factories after delays in enactment made the projects ineligible, saw four of its six states invest in alternative protein. One of them was Western Australia, which poured $3.3M into a factory producing oat milk enriched with lupin protein.

Neighbouring New Zealand, meanwhile, allocated $7M for a project developing alternative proteins from local crops like green peas, oats and hemp.

And in France, the government put restrictions on plant-based meat labels, but also led a $35M Series A fundraise of whole-cut vegan chicken producer Umiami. This was followed by its $8M grant for the company’s commercial-scale factory in 2022, which opened three months ago.

The cellular agriculture supporters

Courtesy: Solar Foods

Six countries were highlighted by the GFI report for their biotech, research and infrastructure support for cultivated and fermentation-derived proteins. Two of the four pillars of Singapore’s $117M Food Story 2.0 programme are relevant to alternative protein, with a heavy focus on cultivated meat.

Israel awarded its previously announced funding of $13M for a precision fermentation contract development manufacturing organisation, while in the US, the Cornucopia programme seeks to create microbial foods, with $10.4M given to one of four fermentation projects over four years.

In February 2023, South Korea’s North Gyeongsang Province led a 28-member MoU to advance the cellular agriculture industry. The province also established a regulation-free zone for proof-of-concept prototypes, and a $6.7M Cellular Agriculture Industry Support Center.

The Netherlands, meanwhile, provided $1.1M from its Cellular Agriculture Netherlands programme for research into producing collagen and elastin through precision fermentation. And Finland supported local fermentation startup Solar Foods with the construction of two facilities through investments and grants, while funding a $5.3M research project for microbial fermentation.

The countries to watch

Courtesy: CellX

Among the six countries, GFI outlined as laying the groundwork for significant investment in the sector, half are in Asia. India’s Ministry of Science and Technology announced a National Biomanufacturing Policy that includes alternative proteins as a key pillar, and created a funding programme to promote millets as a raw material for the plant protein industry, approving a $107,919 project for egg alternatives.

In November 2023, Japan accepted a proposal from three companies for R&D on cultivated wagyu beef, focused on scaling and commercialisation. And China, which included cultivated in its 14th five-year plan in 2022, “offered generous incentives to industry players” – while exact investment numbers are not known, its cultivated meat industry has grown as it’s a lower-cost environment than Europe or the US.

Elsewhere, Brazil may not have announced any new funding in 2023, but its new government’s “prioritisation of sustainability, the green economy, and low-carbon agriculture bodes well for the field”, the report suggests.

South Africa became possibly the first country in the continent to make a public investment in precision fermentation, injecting $700,000 into DeNovo FoodLabs’ development of whey protein. And finally in Spain, the regional government of Catalonia awarded $7M for the construction of a scale-up facility for plant-based and fermented proteins.

The post State of Global Policy: Canada Leads Investment in Alt-Proteins, Asia a Region to Watch appeared first on Green Queen.

This post was originally published on Green Queen.
June 6, 2024

Prolific Machines Nabs $55M to Create Cultivated Meat & Novel Proteins by Harnessing Light

6 Mins Read
Californian biotech startup Prolific Machines has closed a $55M Series B1 round for its photomolecular platform, which leverages light to create novel proteins at significantly lower costs.

The $55M investment represents the first close of Prolific Machines’ Series B round, and was led by Fonterra’s VC arm The Ki Tua Fund. BreakthroughEnergy Ventures, Mayfield, SOSV, Shorewind Capital, Darco Capital, Conti Ventures, In-Q-Tel (IQT), and several others participated as well.

This means the company – which has previously set out its intention to raise a $170M full Series B round – has so far brought in $86.5M in total investment. Investors in its last round in 2022 included the likes of Shark Tank’s Mark Cuban and model and actress Emily Ratajkowski.

Since being founded in 2020, Prolific Machines has developed a photomolecular biology platform to grow and control cells with light, allowing manufacturers to create products across cellular agriculture for the food and medicine industries. It will use the Series B1 capital to commercialise this platform through industry partnerships.

“Photomolecular biology is the use of light and AI to precisely control and optimise cellular behaviour to more efficiently produce superior bioproduct solutions across wide-ranging applications, from food to pharmaceuticals,” co-founder and CEO Deniz Kent tells Green Queen.

“We set out with a vision to use one of our most abundant resources – light – to create an exponentially better way to control biology,” he says, suggesting that this control is “critical to making cheaper and higher-quality products”.

How does Prolific Machines harness light to create proteins?

Courtesy: Prolific Machines

Prolific Machines argues that current cellular biology processes are constrained by “expensive, inefficient, and imprecise molecular methods”. But the precision of light allows it to control these processes in “fundamentally new ways”.

“Prolific harnesses light to produce everyday essentials more efficiently, from food and lifesaving drugs to novel biosolutions,” explains Kent. “We use light as a signal to control cellular behaviour with unprecedented precision and instantly instruct cells on what to do, and where and when to do it. Our process creates significant cost, speed, yield, and quality advantages compared to existing processes.”

The company’s technology is inspired by the field of optogenetics, a combination of genetic and optical methods to control the activity and behaviour of cells through light.

“We use ‘non-ionising’ light at relatively low intensities in our process, which means it doesn’t carry enough energy to harm living cells. It is safe for use in the production of both food and non-food products,” says Kent.

How can light improve existing production techniques?

Prolific Machines founders Max Huisman (CTO), Deniz Kent (CEO) and Declan Jones (CSO) | Courtesy: Prolific Machines

“Methods currently used to make bioproducts are limited to imprecise, inefficient, and expensive control levers – like temperature, chemicals, and proteins – to indirectly control cells,” Kent says. “Prolific’s first-of-its-kind photomolecular platform brings together safe and effective tools – light, bioengineering, hardware, and AI – to unlock unparalleled control and precision.”

He explains that living organisms can sense light because of light-sensitive proteins (LSP), which are naturally occurring proteins found in everything from plants and bacteria to human retinas. These exist to detect and respond to light, and can do this very quickly, causing action in cells within seconds.

“Proteins are at the heart of everything a cell does, from perceiving signals from other cells to switching genes on or off. By attaching LSPs to proteins that you want to control within the cell, Prolific makes it possible to precisely control subcellular biology using light,” he says. When met with light, which acts as a signal, the LSPs can control cells across key functions.

“Prolific unlocks dynamic control by pulsating light in specific patterns, intensities, and wavelengths to activate cellular functions when and where it matters most, which is a game-changer for biotechnology,” adds Kent.

What kind of products can Prolific Machines create?

Courtesy: Prolific Machines

So what kind of products can you produce using light? “Prolific is co-developing the future of biology with innovators across cultivated meat, nutritional and therapeutic proteins, disease models, tissue engineering, cell and gene therapy, and beyond,” he reveals.

“Examples include nutritional proteins used in supplements and infant formula, antibodies to treat diseases, whole cuts of cultured meat, higher fidelity disease models, and other innovations never before possible.”

Kent calls the process a “boon” for cultivated meat, with companies able to achieve “massive cost, scale, and sterility benefits without the need for recombinant proteins or growth factors”.

“Using light, our process can create structured or marbled products, like steaks. We can create all cuts of meat that would be impossible to make in a scalable manner with existing cultivated production methods,” he says. “Our process provides unparalleled spatial control, creating the patterning and structure to make alternative protein products with first-of-its-kind texture, taste, and affordability.”

As for “nutritional proteins”, this could entail many “high-value proteins”, including those found in infant formula, such as lactoferrin (whose precision-fermented version has only recently been commercialised).

Can light help make cultivated meat cheaper?

Courtesy: Ark Biotech

Prolific Machines suggests that the first applications of its technology will be announced via partnerships with manufacturers in the coming months. The company has already established two “robust” mammalian cell lines to support its food and pharmaceutical partners.

While more details on pricing will be available once these link-ups are established, Kent offers: “One of the key benefits of our photomolecular platform is cost efficiency due to our use of light, which is the cheapest possible input into biology. Our process also removes the need for costly growth factors, which are the most expensive part of the cultivated meat process.”

Reducing the cost and scaling up production are the two key manufacturing challenges facing producers in this space. While companies have managed to reduce costs by 99% in less than a decade, forecasts show these proteins won’t price parity until 2030. But startups like Meatly and BioCraft Pet Nutrition (both making cultivated pet food) have announced breakthroughs in their culture media to drastically bring down the cost of their products.

“Our platform elevates our partners’ existing cell lines and product approaches, providing a critical infrastructure layer for biology,” says Kent. “Think of us as the ‘NVIDIA for biology’. We are already co-developing the future of biology with a number of partners.”

While some countries and US states have imposed bans on cultivated meat, these proteins have been championed by UN climate bodies like the IPCC and the UNEP, since they have a much smaller environmental footprint, can secure the food system against climate and disease shocks, and feed an ever-hungrier planet poised to have 10 billion people by 2050.

The post Prolific Machines Nabs $55M to Create Cultivated Meat & Novel Proteins by Harnessing Light appeared first on Green Queen.

This post was originally published on Green Queen.
June 6, 2024

Cultivated Meat Startup Aleph Farms Lays Off 30% of Staff As Part of ‘Asset-Light’ Growth Strategy

5 Mins Read
Israeli cultivated meat producer Aleph Farms has let go of 30% of its domestic workforce, reportedly due to difficulties in securing capital amid its scale-up process.

Aleph Farms, one of only four companies cleared to sell cultivated meat, has laid off about 30 of its 100 local employees, owing to difficulties in raising capital amid a wider investment decline in the sector, according to Israeli food tech publication CTech.

An Aleph Farms spokesperson confirmed the news. “As we transition towards larger-scale production and commercialisation, we are maintaining R&D and production in Israel while expanding globally through co-manufacturers, in line with our capital-efficient and asset-light approach,” they told Green Queen.

“We are adapting our organisation to align with this next growth phase, and need to part ways with approximately 30% of our local employees. We care for all affected employees and will be supporting them in the new job search.”

Aleph Farms had ‘expected significant expansion’ this year

Courtesy: Aleph Farms

Around the same time CTech reported the news last night, Aleph Farms posted an update on social media. “The ability to adapt is fundamental at all levels of life, enabling us to navigate change and foster growth over time,” it read. It’s unclear whether this was in reference to the restructuring, but it did mark a departure from the style of its other posts.

Aleph Farms started the year with the biggest milestone in its seven-year history, earning regulatory approval to sell its cultivated beef in Israel. The startup had announced its intention to roll out its Black Angus Petit Steak under the Aleph Cuts brand at select restaurants in the country, with a longer-term goal of making it available to retailers.

Since then, it has struck a deal to produce cultivated meat in Thailand, and partnered with a biotech startup to leverage AI to reduce costs and enable scalability. These advancements followed the 2022 opening of its 65,000 sq ft plant in Rehovot, Israel, allowing it to initially produce 10 tonnes of cultivated steak annually, the acquisition of another manufacturing facility in Modi’in, as well as the agreement with ESCO Aster in Singapore (the world’s first approved industrial manufacturer for cultivated meat).

The company has previously outlined its aim to reach $1B in revenue by 2030, and has so far raised $118M in funding. Its last investment round was in 2022, bringing in a sizeable Series B amount of $105M. But struggles in securing investment, the global decrease in alternative protein funding, and the geopolitical tension with the Israel-Hamas war have put pressure on the company, according to CTech.

The publication cited strategic plans and investor promises to suggest that Aleph Farms had hoped for a different year. One industry insider was quoted as saying: “They expected a very significant expansion this year, but the situation in Israel is difficult for the entire market. All companies are reexamining their expenses.”

Israel’s alternative protein challenges – and potential

Courtesy: GFI

Alternative protein investments saw a marked downturn in 2023, among a wider VC fallout from food tech. According to the Good Food Institute (GFI), food tech companies received 61% fewer VC dollars last year than in 2022, while alternative protein funding dropped by 44% to $1.6B.

Cultivated meat companies were hit especially hard, with investment down by 75% from 2022. And this loss of faith among VCs has continued, with the first quarter of 2024 seeing merely 5% of the $226M invested in the sector in all of last year. It’s why AgFunder has earmarked cultivated meat as a “category to watch” this year.

Within Israel, VC fundraising was down by 74% in 2023, hitting an eight-year low. Coupled with the struggles of the fintech sector, several other startups have been forced to make cutbacks in their workforce.

That said, despite a dip in alternative protein financing, interest in the industry remains strong in Israel. The country was responsible for 10% of the sector’s investments globally in the last decade, second only to the US, according to a recent report. Last year, a record 15 new startups began working on novel proteins, taking the total to 73. And in 2022, the Israeli Innovation Authority (IIA) established an $18M research consortium for cultivated meat, comprising 14 companies and 10 academic laboratories.

Courtesy: GFI Israel

The analysis also outlined the industry’s long-term potential, forecasting that it will generate 10,000 additional jobs (a third of which would be manufacturing roles), have more than 200 companies and over a dozen manufacturing facilities, and contribute $2.5B to Israel’s economy by 2030. The report’s authors encouraged investors to take confidence in the IIA’s efforts and pump significant capital into the sector

But as Aleph Farms pointed out, challenges remain, especially for companies trying to expand their production capacity. “Scaling up manufacturing for Israeli startups is challenging due to infrastructure costs, mirroring challenges encountered by startups worldwide,” Alla Voldman, VP of strategy and policy at GFI Israel, told Green Queen last month.

She added that the geopolitical situation is heartbreaking. “However, the Israeli entrepreneurs proved their resilience in ensuring their companies meet the milestones,” she said. “We believe that the increasing need for food security solutions locally and across the globe will drive additional private and public investments in this sector toward innovative technological solutions.”

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June 6, 2024

Myocopia: Can Cell Metabolism Be the Catalyst for Cost-Effective Cultivated Meat?

3 Mins Read
Finnish researchers have come up with a way to make cultivated meat without expensive growth factors, relying on stem cell metabolism instead.

As the race to produce cost-effective cuts of cultivated meat continues, researchers at the University of Helsinki are proposing an alternative to one of the most expensive parts of the manufacturing process.

“All companies run into problems at roughly the same point of scaling up production,” said Pekka Katajisto, who is leading the team at the Helsinki Institute of Life Science (HiLife).

The solution, then, lies in the technology developed under its Myocopia project, which relies on stem cell metabolism instead of growth factors. Can it help companies bring costs on par with conventional meat?

Cells grow meat only when instructed

Courtesy: Eat Just

Culture media are an essential part of cultivated meat production, comprising a mix of nutrients to facilitate the growth of animal cells. This accounts for the majority of the costs involved in the entire process, with growth factors – which help the cells differentiate – responsible for the bulk of those.

Companies have been working on ways to bring these prices down – typically, culture media cost hundreds of dollars per litre. Last month, UK company Meatly, which is on the verge of receiving regulatory approval for its cultivated pet food in the country, announced it had reduced the cost of its culture medium to $1.25 per litre by developing a protein-free version.

And just last week, fellow cultivated pet food producer BioCraft Pet Nutrition announced it had reached price parity with premium conventional meat by developing a nutrient medium composed of plant-based ingredients.

At Katajisto’s lab, which is connected to the Centre of Excellence in Stem Cell Metabolism, researchers studied how cell metabolism regulates the division and differentiation of stem cells. This led to an innovation that can keep the cells expanding longer than with current methods, and grow meat only when instructed to do so, enabling precise control in bioreactors.

“The cells can be kept multiplying in a financially viable way until the reactor is full. The cells are then guided to form meat – again using their own metabolism,” said Katajisto.

Myocopia plans to spin out in two years

Courtesy: University of Helsinki

The idea was first tested using capital from HiLife’s proof-of-concept funding. Once they achieved promising results, the team received state financing from Business Finland to commercialise its technology. Under the latter, Myocopia will validate the tech on “commercially interesting” meat products like beef, pork and poultry.

“We want to increase our understanding of the market and finetune our technology,” said Swetha Gopalakrishnan, scientific lead of the Myocopia project, who made the original observation that led to the innovation.

The goal is to become a B2B provider that can license its technical knowhow to cultivated meat producers. Olga Balakina, commercialisation specialist for the project, is assessing the market for potential partners. “Our top priority is to identify the companies with which we can launch a pilot,” she said.

Technology companies are of particular interest, since they can help the Myocopia team tailor the innovation based on market needs. The team has already begun the patenting process, and aims to speak to VCs and impact investors for financing next year.

“After two years, we can strive to establish a spinout,” said Balakina. As a “tech enabler” of the industry, one of its solutions could be “a cell-growing cocktail” that could stimulate growth effectively in existing bioreactors.

“I believe our innovation is going to be a game changer in the emerging industry as a whole,” added Katajisto.

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June 5, 2024

Future Food Quick Bites: Non-Dairy Starbucks, Vegan Flights & A Bezos Protein Centre

5 Mins Read
In our weekly column, we round up the latest news and developments in the alternative protein and sustainable food industry. This week, Future Food Quick Bites covers Starbucks’ upcoming Oatly collaboration, a vegan certification for hospitality operators, and Bezos Earth Fund’s alternative protein centre.

New products and launches

For its summer menu, Starbucks is reportedly launching a vegan cinnamon crumble Frappuccino with Oatly‘s vanilla Oat Whip, which will be available for a free swap – a welcome policy change from the coffee chain. It will also offer a non-dairy vanilla sweet cream cold brew, and free plant-based cold foam substitutes for all core drinks.

Courtesy: Big Box Vegan

Speaking of which, Oatly has now launched its 1.5-litre barista milk in the UK, which was teased in its latest earnings call to investors.

Also in the UK, The Coconut Collaborative has unveiled what it says is the country’s first vegan yoghurt and granola topper.

British vegan pet food maker Hownd has gained a listing for three hypoallergenic functional treat ranges – Keep Calm for stress relief, Got an Itch? for healthy skin and coat, and Yup You Stink! for bad breath – at Pets at Home, which will be available in stores nationwide in September.

Fellow UK startup Sun Bear Biofuture has joined the expanding roster of companies offering sustainable alternatives to palm oil. Its deforestation-free innovation is derived from fermentation and makes use of agricultural sidestreams as feedstocks.

Courtesy: Beyond Meat

Meanwhile, plant-based giant Beyond Meat has rolled out a new SKU in the UK. The spicy jalapeño burger is available at 280 Tesco and Sainsbury’s stores each, with a frozen version coming to 200 locations each in September.

In the US, Tomorrow Farms‘ animal-free milk Bored Cow, which uses Perfect Day‘s precision-fermented whey protein, has expanded into 2,000 new stores nationwide, with additional 11oz packaging for the original flavour plus four-packs now available in Albertsons, Safeway, Sprouts, Fresh Thyme, Central Market, and Shaws, among others.

Consultancy network Vegan Hospitality has launched a global certification programme for tourism and hospitality companies, offering companies expert strategy consulting, online staff training, promotional support, and free auditing.

Courtesy: Planteneers

In Germany, plant-based producer Planteneers has introduced a lineup of vegan desserts, comprising tiramisu, cheesecake, fermented oat dessert, pudding, and soft ice cream. They’re positioned as “healthy but indulgent” alternatives to their dairy counterparts.

German airline caterer LSG Group has teamed up with Unilever-owned plant-based meat brand The Vegetarian Butcher to offer vegan meals for onboard dining.

More news from the skies: Spanish meat analogues maker Heura and vegan cheese giant Violife have partnered with Vueling Airlines to launch a plant-based burger on the carrier’s summer menu, which is priced at €8.50.

Courtesy: Bernat Anaños/LinkedIn

There’s a new plant-based butchery in Prague. Located in the Czech capital’s Letná district, Bezmasna features meatloafs, cold cuts, deli salads, as well as chlebíček (Czech sandwiches).

Singaporean startup Jiro-Meat is aiming to commercialise its upcycled plant-based meat made from okara – the fibrous pulp leftover from soy milk and tofu production – in the next six months.

And in India, Nestlé has rolled out a limited-edition edible plant-based fork for its Maggi cup noodles. The two-piece fork is made from wheat flour and salt.

Finance and company updates

The Bezos Earth Fund has opened its first Center for Sustainable Protein at North Carolina State University, supported by a $30M fund. The facility aims to advance alternative protein production and commercialisation, and has onboarded Believer Meats (which is due to open its own cultivated meat facility in the state later this year) as a partner.

Germany’s Planteneers has also opened a Customer Center of Excellence in Aurora, Illinois as part of its North American expansion. The facility will let customers collaborate on product development and create ingredient solutions via a plant-based meat laboratory (it will soon have one for alt-dairy too).

Courtesy: PROT

Indian vegan seafood player SeaSpire has rebranded to PROT, as it diversifies into other plant protein sources. Its alt-seafood lineup is being relaunched as a ‘Gill-t Free’ range ahead of World Ocean Day (June 8), supported by Veganuary India‘s Fish-Free Week campaign.

Danish plant protein powder Nutrumami has closed a €450,000 seed funding round to expand its team and prepare for market launch.

Policy and research developments

A 9,272-person survey by YouGov shows that if cultivated meat was on par with conventional meat, only half would continue eating the latter (nearly a quarter remain unsure of what they’ll do). It’s an improvement from the 40% who would otherwise ‘definitely not’ eat cultivated meat. Meanwhile, Americans remain very split over bans on these products.

Courtesy: YouGov

In the UK, Calderdale Council in West Yorkshire – which adopted a climate change emergency policy in 2020 – wants to make its menus fully plant-based, with a preference for seasonal, non-processed foods.

A joint venture between the Artevelde University of Applied Sciences and the City of Ghent has seen a food waste monitor installed in several restaurants, which will use the smart scale to better measure how much food is being thrown away.

Courtesy: Eat Differently

Finally, advocacy group Eat Differently has rolled out a parody ad campaign called Hate Vegans? in Los Angeles. It aims to highlight the reasons people care about plant-based diets and their impact on the planet – ‘injuries’ sustained from preachy vegans could turn into settlements with the help of fictional attorney Seymour Loudermilk.

Check out last week’s Future Food Quick Bites.

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June 5, 2024

Forsea Foods Hosts Cultivated Eel Tasting in Israel, Aims for 2026 Rollout

6 Mins Read
Israeli alternative protein startup Forsea Foods held an intimate tasting event for its cultivated unagi in Tel Aviv, with plans to launch the eel meat in Japan by 2026.

Investors, journalists, food manufacturers, opinion leaders and government representatives all convened at A, the Japanese restaurant in Tel Aviv, to get a taste of cultivated unagi yesterday.

The event, hosted by Forsea Foods, showcased three dishes featuring the Israeli startup’s cultivated freshwater eel as a centrepiece, nearly five months after it debuted the first prototype of the seafood innovation.

The highlight of the menu was unagi kabayaki, a traditional Japanese dish featuring a grilled eel fillet on a bed of rice. The preparation of the eel was supported by Yuval Ben Neriah, head chef and owner of A, and Katsumi Kusumoto, owner of Tokyo vegan restaurant Saido. It was an extension of the latter’s collaboration with Forsea Foods, having created two unagi dishes as proof of concept back in January.

“This project with Forsea has been particularly exciting as it marks my first venture into future food and the world of cell-cultured seafood and its resonating sustainability message,” said Ben Neriah. “The feedback from the diners was indeed uplifting. Several remarked that they wouldn’t have guessed that the unagi was cell-cultivated had they not been informed.”

Now, the company plans to hold further tasting events outside Israel this year, in preparation for regulatory applications and a market launch slated for 2026.

Courtesy: Liran Maimon

Hybrid seafood tasting pinpoints the cost challenge

Forsea Foods’ patented method for cultivated seafood uses organoid technology to create 3D microtissues comprising fat, muscle and connective tissues, which can mimic the functions and structure of organs. These spontaneously differentiate into edible cells, replicating the natural process of cell formation.

Moreover, the cell lines can self-organise into tissue structures without scaffold support. This simplifies the production process, eases supply chain bottlenecks for eel meat, and enhances the potential for scalability. And by significantly reducing the reliance on growth factors, the startup can produce in an efficient and cost-effective manner.

A $4.3B market, eel has always been a luxury seafood product, commanding wholesale prices between $40 and $60 per kg in Japan (which consumes over 70% of all eel catch). But overfishing, poaching, illegal trading, breeding troubles and pollution have ravaged supplies of the fish, with consumption declining from about 160,000 tonnes in 2000 to just over 60,000 tonnes in 2021 in Japan.

All this has made eel a critically endangered species and likely to become more expensive as demand doesn’t seem to be slowing down. Tackling costs is crucial, and it’s something that has been a major challenge for cultivated meat companies ever since the advent of the technology.

This is why most cultivated meat products that have come to the market or been showcased in public tastings are actually hybrids of plant-based ingredients and cultivated cells, which helps lower costs and makes them commercially viable. The eel presented in Forsea Foods’ tasting also contained plants, revealed co-founder and CEO Roee Nir.

While he didn’t disclose the amount of eel cell biomass used, he told Green Queen that “it was very evident in the tasting experience”. But Forsea Foods, which is working to scale up its process now, is confident about the price equation, with Nir suggesting that its technology will allow it to bring costs below price parity once it reaches larger production levels.

Courtesy: Liran Maimon

“The current R&D cost of the dishes we served is not really relevant to the price of the future product,” he argued. “Our organoid technology has several remarkable advantages related to the price parity challenge – it reduces the use of growth factors, eliminates the need for the scaffolding stage and makes the production process much more scalable.”

He added: “Forsea’s unique organoid technology has the potential to overcome many of the industry bottlenecks in bringing cultivated meat to the consumer plate… This event was a great opportunity for us to present our unprecedented achievements to partners and industry stakeholders.”

Forsea Foods hopes to debut cultivated unagi in Japan by 2026

One of the 40 attendees of Forsea Foods’ tasting event was Takahashi Seiichiro, Japan’s deputy chief of mission to Israel. It’s a marker of the startup’s commercialisation plans, targeting the main consumer of eel meet globally. “While we Japanese have been eating eel for more than 5000 years, we understand that cultivating eel is no simple task. Therefore, I believe that introducing the first cell-cultured eel is the accomplished result of great comprehensive corporate efforts,” said Seiichiro.

Forsea Foods is developing relationships with strategic partnerships in Japan as it targets a commercial debut of its cultivated eel in 2026. Saido – which already serves a vegan version of the fish – has previously indicated its intention to offer cultivated unagi once regulatory approval comes through. The startup previously told Green Queen it’s in talks with food safety authorities in Singapore too, but Nir said the plan is to introduce its product in Japan first, since it’s a “far larger” market.

Japan is among the countries advancing regulatory progress for novel foods. In April, the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (which will continue to oversee food safety) transferred its food hygiene standards division to the Consumer Affairs Agency. Companies now must liaise with two agencies on regulatory conversations, but this puts the ultimate responsibility in prime minister Fumio Kishida’s hands.

“The Japanese regulatory process establishment is being drafted these days. That takes time. However, there is a strong backwind from the government to promote this industry,” Nir said, pointing to Kishida’s comments last year that called cellular agriculture an important part of “realising a sustainable food supply”. “Our assumption is that cultivated meat will be approved, if not late 2025, in early 2026,” he added.

Courtesy: Liran Maimon

Looking forward, the company is now working to enhance its recipes. Since the start of the year, we made significant advancements in improving our cell lines,” said Nir, who added that Forsea Foods is working on six different cell lines.

The startup, which has so far raised $5.2M in seed financing, will soon launch its Series A funding round, with plans to use the capital to establish a commercial pilot plant (the location of which is yet to be decided). It’s a tough funding environment for cultivated meat, where investments declined by 78% in 2023.

“Investors are now more selective and looking for companies with technological and commercial advantages. Forsea has a very unique organoid technology that allows it to reach price parity faster and bring its product to the consumer’s plate,” said Nir. “In addition, the company’s focus species at risk, which have a high price point and large market potential, allow it to target a very attractive market. Our first product, the cultivated eel, is very attractive in the Asian, European and American markets.”

Forsea Foods is the only known company working on cultivated eel, but others are producing plant-based versions. Fellow Israeli startup Steakholder Foods showcased a 3D-printed alternative in December (it plans to include cultured eel cells in the product at a later stage, if costs allow). Meanwhile, New York’s Ocean Hugger Foods and Japanese giant Nissin already have vegan eels on the market (using aubergines and soy protein, respectively).

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June 4, 2024

With $750,000 in Funding, Kokomodo Emerges as Latest Cell-Based Chocolate Player

6 Mins Read
Israeli startup Kokomodo has emerged from stealth with a $750,000 investment to produce cocoa and chocolate products via cellular agriculture.

As the future of chocolate becomes increasingly uncertain, Kokomodo is the latest startup innovating to protect cocoa from climate change, and climate change from cocoa.

Armed with a $750,000 investment from The Kitchen FoodTech Hub and the Israeli Innovation Authority, the Rehovot-based player has come out of stealth to produce cell-based cocoa for the food and beverage, supplements and cosmetics industries.

Kokomodo derives its climate-resilient product from the cells of premium cocoa beans grown in Central and South America. Having successfully completed lab-scale production, it will use the capital to expand to pilot scale and utilise its bioprocessing systems to get closer to price parity with conventional chocolate, according to co-founder and CEO Tal Govrin.

“We are moving to produce biomass in a scalable bioreactor to further increase production volume and optimise it,” she tells Green Queen. “In 18 to 24 months, we plan to produce hundreds of litres in bioreactors, working toward reaching commercial scale.”

Speaking about the funding round, she added: “We will also focus on client engagement and widening our range of products, as well as regulations and IP submissions to extend our go-to-market.”

Why Kokomodo is making cell-based chocolate

Courtesy: Kokomodo

Kokomodo is the result of a joint venture between The Kitchen FoodTech Hub and Tel Aviv-based Plantae Bioscience, whose technology has been developed behind closed doors for the last two years. “Kokomodo is promoting a variety of causes such as preservation of cacao, fair trade and shorter supply chains, to name only a few,” said Amir Zaidman, chief business officer of The Kitchen FoodTech Hub.

As an industry, cocoa is getting decimated by climate change, with scientists saying a third of cocoa trees could die out by 2050. Extreme weather events have ruined harvests and led to a shortage of cocoa, pushing prices up to all-time highs this year. In April, a tonne of cocoa was priced at over $12,000 – for context, it was under $2,500 in January 2023. Farmers in Ivory Coast, the largest cocoa producer, are truly feeling the heat, where more than 85% of the forest has been lost since 1960.

Meanwhile, producing cocoa products themselves has a highly detrimental impact on the planet. Only beef pollutes the atmosphere more than dark chocolate, and cocoa beans have one of the highest carbon opportunity costs (the amount of carbon lost from native vegetation and soils to produce food).

“Kokomodo was born from a profound passion for preserving the supply of cocoa,” says Govrin. “Our cellular agriculture technology ensures a steady flow of premium, health-boosting cocoa, aligning consumer enjoyment with global responsibility.”

Current trends point to price parity potential

Courtesy: Kokomodo

The startup chose to source from Latin America as the region is known for its premium cocoa beans. “We aimed to obtain different varieties and genotypes to explore and take advantage of the potential of natural variance. We also obtain different cell lines originating from different parts of the cacao seedling while creating a cacao cell library and analytical capabilities to seek out the best cacao cells to produce,” explains Govrin.

“These carefully chosen cells are then cultivated using state-of-the-art cellular agriculture technology, nurturing them into a thriving cell culture. As the biomass grows, the production process moves to advanced bioreactors, where the cacao is harvested and processed according to the specific requirements of each application.”

She adds that Kokomodo’s “technologically systematic” approach ensures that its cocoa retains the quality and authenticity of the beans. “Through the company’s technology process, Kokomodo ensures cocoa that matches traditional chocolate flavours and textures, offering the genuine taste and characteristics of real cocoa (aroma, flavours, and sweetness), while capturing the nutraceutical values and health benefits of cacao.”

One of the biggest hurdles for any cellular agriculture company – but particularly one aiming to disrupt an already volatile market – is cost. While cocoa prices have been skyrocketing, matching it on price is still a tall order for cell-based producers.

But Govrin believes cell-cultured cocoa can be price-competitive due to two trends. “On one hand, the scalability of cell culture cacao production is expected to increase, leading to lower prices as the technology matures,” she says. “Simultaneously, traditional cocoa farming faces mounting economic and environmental pressures, which could drive up the prices of conventionally grown cocoa.”

She adds: “As the rising prices, costs and supply challenges of traditional cocoa cultivation intensify due to climate change impacts, disease, and overreliance on a few producer countries like Ghana and Ivory Coast, cell-cultured cocoa will provide a more sustainable and resilient solution for the industry.”

Choosing a non-agricultural solution over cocoa-free chocolate

Courtesy: Kokomodo

Govrin suggests that Kokomodo is targeting premium brands that prioritise sustainable and ethical cocoa products, while actively exploring innovative technologies for cocoa cultivation. Its first product is a “high-value cocoa powder” that can be integrated into various products, followed by cocoa butter.

The idea is to use its cell-based cocoa products across different CPG categories, including chocolate, beverages, spreads, and protein bars. Its potential customers can get access to “custom-fit cocoa for diverse market demands”, the CEO says.

But before any of that, the company will need to pass regulatory barriers in the countries it wants to commercialise in. Govrin indicates that a US launch may be more suitable, given that the self-affirmed GRAS process there is much simpler and quicker than the EU’s novel food regulations. “We are currently working with regulation advisors who can provide the required support to build our regulation strategy and application. Submission will take place once the growth process in bioreactors is established,” she reveals.

Kokomodo is among just a handful of companies working on cell-based chocolate, alongside fellow Israeli startup Celleste Bio, US producer California Cultured, and Finnish giant Fazer. More companies – such as Voyage Foods, Planet A Foods, Win-Win and Foreverland – are instead making cocoa-free alternatives to chocolate, using plants and fermentation to create chocolate-like products.

What does Govrin think about this approach? “We master the very essence of cacao as we select and cultivate cacao cells from a variety of real premium beans. It is the real thing. Not ‘like’ cocoa, nor is it a ‘substitute’,” she says, reiterating the nutraceutical values of cocoa to illustrate how Kokomodo’s innovation differs from “chocolate substitutes that contain a high level of refined sugar and vegetable fat”.

“Kokomodo uses science and technology to develop real cocoa in a way that is most impactful to human health and makes it readily available for use in consumer products. Cellular agriculture technology is a game changer in being able to bring cocoa to the market all year round,” she adds.

“With climate change threatening cocoa, a non-agricultural solution to produce it could ensure its survival for future generations, as we don’t want to give up on this powerful plant.”

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May 31, 2024

Pulmuone Signs R&D Deal with Robotics Company ABB to Advance Cultivated Seafood Plans

4 Mins Read
South Korea’s Pulmuone is making its move into cultivated seafood with an R&D partnership with robotics company ABB.

Seoul-based plant protein giant Pulmuone has partnered with Swiss robotics company ABB to advance AI-assisted research and development into cultivated seafood production.

ABB’s expertise lies in electrification, automation and digitalisation technologies, and Pulmuone plans to leverage these capabilities to inform its efforts towards commercialising cultivated seafood.

The manufacturing process involves isolating cells from living fish, which are then used to make cell cultures. Pulmuone aims to automate this process with ABB’s robotics tech as part of its strategy to become a global future food leader.

“By combining Pulmuone’s specialised seafood cell cultivation core technology with ABB’s world-leading AI robotics technology, we expect to strengthen our technological competitiveness and create more synergy in advanced seafood food tech R&D,” said Sang-Gu Kim, head of food safety at the Pulmuone Technology Center.

Pulmuone looks to cultivated seafood to drive future growth

Courtesy: Pulmuone

Pulmuone claims the partnership will be the first time AI and robot automation tech have been used for cell cultivation. “We will accelerate the establishment of an innovative mass production system for sustainable seafood cell-cultured food in the near future, leading to groundbreaking technological innovation,” said Kim.

In addition to the joint R&D for automating seafood cell cultivation, the collaboration will also see them analyse the production efficiency and productivity improvements achieved through the automaton process.

Plus, the partnership entails the protection of intellectual property for co-technologies and products, allowing both companies to safeguard their innovations. And they’ll also be able to mutually utilise research facilities and equipment, as well as exchange professional expertise.

Pulmuone, a market leader in tofu production for 40 years, hopes to reach mass production of cultivated seafood by 2026. The move is part of its drive to become an ESG leader internationally, as it aims to break even overseas this year. Last year, its sales reached nearly ₩3T ($2.1B). Its growth strategy is based upon four pillars: sustainable food expansion, global market expansion, strengthening ESG management, and future readiness through food tech.

The company has previously partnered with the likes of fellow Seoul-based startup Simple Planet (which it’s an investor in) to develop hybrid meat – a mix of cultivated and plant-based ingredients – and California’s BlueNalu to bring cultivated seafood to South Korea.

South Korea’s booming cultivated meat sector

Courtesy: Simple Planet

The Pulmuone-ABB deal is yet another development in South Korea’s burgeoning cultivated meat sector. There has been a new wave of activity ever since the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety established a framework for regulatory approval of novel foods in February.

It came a year after the opening of the North Gyeongsang Cellular Agriculture Industry Support Center, a 2,309 sq m facility built over six years with a ₩9B ($7M) investment to develop biomaterials and support cultivated meat companies.

In April, the government created a regulatory-free special zone for the development of cultivated foods in the eastern province of Gyeongsangbuk-do. It harbours 10 startups that are working towards the commercialisation of cultivated meat, with ₩19.9B ($14.4M) set aside for the project.

And earlier this month, the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries announced that it will invest ₩28.6B ($21M) in research funding for plant-based and cultivated seafood technologies.

“Korea’s leaders see the writing on the wall and understand that making meat more efficiently is a critical part of building a secure and sustainable food system in Asia,” Sam Lawrence, vice president of strategy and policy for Asia at the Good Food Institute, told Green Queen in April.

“There’s no pathway to decarbonising our protein supply without a rapid acceleration in future food manufacturing, which creates an enormous economic opportunity for nations that lead the way. By making bold public investments in cultivated meat development, Korea is signalling to food innovators around the world that they’re open for business,” he added.

A 1,110-person survey by the APAC Society for Cellular Agriculture in October revealed that 90% of South Koreans were willing to try cultivated meat at least once, and 39% were supportive of it being sold at supermarkets and restaurants. Price, however, is a key purchase driver, cited by 65% of respondents, followed by taste and texture (62%) and health/nutrition (48%).

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May 30, 2024

BioCraft Pet Nutrition’s Cultivated Mouse Meat Now Costs the Same as Premium Pet Food

5 Mins Read
Austrian-American cultivated meat startup BioCraft Pet Nutrition has achieved price parity with premium pet food by reimagining the growth media for its mouse meat.

BioCraft Pet Nutrition has achieved a breakthrough in its production process that allows it to make its cultivated mouse meat for dogs and cats at the same price as premium pet food.

Along with scalability, cost has been a major hindrance to the progress of cultivated meat, which requires expensive growth media and bioreactors to make. Finding solutions to make these proteins more affordable has been a priority for companies in this space.

And while there have been some major strides – startups have managed to bring down costs by 99% in less than a decade – McKinsey suggests it will still take until 2030 for cultivated meat to reach price parity with its conventional counterpart.

But BioCraft (formerly called Because Animals) says its cultivated meat now has a sale price of $2-2.50, on par with premium meat in pet food. It has achieved this milestone by reimaging the use of growth media to both cut costs and boost the nutritional profile of its mouse meat.

“Achieving price parity and a robust nutritional profile for pets were the only elements holding back cultivated meat for the pet food industry – and BioCraft has now achieved both,” said founder and CEO Shannon Falconer.

The startup now aims to put its cultivated meat in branded pet food on shelves by early 2026.

How BioCraft Pet Nutrition makes affordable cultivated meat

Courtesy: BioCraft Pet Nutrition

Typically, growth media – the mix of proteins, sugar and nutrients that feed animal cells in a bioreactor – cost hundreds of dollars per litre. Proteins represent the most expensive component of the growth media, while individually produced amino acids are another costly element.

One of the key processes to reduce costs is to move away from animal-derived materials and provide nutrients from crops instead. This is something BioCraft focused on too, developing a nutrient medium composed of plant-based ingredients widely used in pet food applications (and therefore already approved by food safety regulators).

“By taking this approach, we simultaneously developed a nutrient that is both suitable for our cells and suitable for pet nutrition. This also means that we don’t need to perform any downstream processing as all of the ‘inputs’ we feed to our cells are already feed-approved,” explained Falconer.

“But most importantly, by not separating our nutrient formulation and our cells in any downstream processing steps, BioCraft is able to retain those key water-soluble nutrients that only animal cells manufacture (for example, taurine), and which are released by actively growing cells into the surrounding environment,” she added.

“What we’re left with in the end is a nutrient-dense slurry of animal cells, animal-derived nutrients and plant-derived nutrients, which is essentially what meat from an herbivore (like a cow) actually is. This slurry can then be used as a substitute for traditional animal-based slurry ingredients, which pet food manufacturers already use.”

While the nutrient-rich growth media is typically discarded, BioCraft discovered it could be specifically formulated to provide a nutritious part of the end product, which more closely mimics conventional meat. This leads to no waste of nutrient inputs, which are leveraged to bolster the final nutritional value of the product.

BioCraft’s mouse meat slurry is said to be rich in essential nutrients like protein, DHA, EPA (an omega-3 fatty acid), and taurine. This emphasis on nutrition for dogs and cats was a catalyst for decreasing the cultivated meat’s costs. “By focusing on the application of pet food, BioCraft’s approach is very different from that being pursued by companies focused on cultivated meat for humans,” Falconer said.

“Specifically, where the main focus for the human food industry is making the product taste and look like the meat people are used to (and at the price point they’re used to), the main focus for BioCraft is ensuring a nutritional profile that is as good or better than the meat pet food manufacturers are used to (and at the price point they’re used to).”

Regulatory plans and B2B business model

Courtesy: BioCraft Pet Nutrition

BioCraft’s breakthrough comes the same month British cultivated meat startup Meatly announced a drastic reduction in culture media costs for its pet food. The latter is on the verge of receiving the regulatory greenlight in the UK, with its cultivated meat cans expected to be on shelves imminently. Falconer remained tight-lipped when asked about her company’s regulatory plans, but teased an announcement soon.

Instead of rolling out its own packaged products, BioCraft – which has brought in $6.7M in funding to date – will provide its cultivated meat ingredients to other manufacturers for use in pet food formulations. “As a mission-based company whose priority is to remove animals from the supply chain, moving as much volume of cultivated meat as possible is key,” said Falconer.

“Building a brand that is able to replace hundreds of millions of kg of animal meat used in pet food per year would take a very, very long time. And the planet doesn’t have that time. Working with pet food manufacturers who already have the consumer base and are already purchasing that very same meat ingredient that we’d like to replace makes much more sense to us than selling B2C,” she added.

Cultivated meat has been a hot topic in the US of late, with the states of Florida and Alabama banning the production and sale of these products in an election year, claiming food safety issues and citing their aim to safeguard the local livestock industry. Both moves have been widely criticised, especially since the USDA and FDA have both cleared cultivated meat for sale after rigorous testing processes.

“In the early days of scaled commercialisation, the demand for cultivated meat will be much higher than initial supply will be able to fill,” said Falconer, whose company has also developed a chicken cell line. “During that time, pet food manufacturers can simply focus on selling in other states.”

Pet food puts an enormous toll on the planet – in the US alone, dry cat and dog food production amounts to 25-30% of all animal-consumption-related emissions. Research has also suggested that if pets were a nation, they’d be the fifth-largest meat-consuming entity. It’s figures like these that have prompted companies like BioCraft and Meatly to produce climate-friendly pet food. Others in the space include Bene Meat Technologies, Wild Earth, and Bond Pet Foods.

The post BioCraft Pet Nutrition’s Cultivated Mouse Meat Now Costs the Same as Premium Pet Food appeared first on Green Queen.

This post was originally published on Green Queen.
May 29, 2024

Future Food Quick Bites: Vegan Indian, EU Elections & Squeezy Mayo

6 Mins Read
In our weekly column, we round up the latest news and developments in the alternative protein and sustainable food industry. This week, Future Food Quick Bites covers a new vegan restaurant in India, blended meat for kids, and Oatly’s climate election pledge.

New products and launches

Indian e-marketplace Vegan Dukan has opened Rollin’ Plantz, a plant-based restaurant in Bengaluru, which features Indian dishes and international favourites with a mix of whole foods and meat analogues.

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Singapore’s PetCubes has tapped Indonesian startup Green Rebel Foods‘ plant-based meat to launch a plant-based dog food SKU called Vegan Formula, which is high in protein and low in carbs.

South Korean plant-based meat startup Unlimeat showcased its new line of Korean fried chicken at the National Restaurant Association in Chicago (May 21-27), featuring original, extra spicy, and Cheongyang Mayo flavours.

The event also saw Tofurky unveil vegan hot dogs (a first for the brand) and new deli slices, which now contain 13g of protein per serving.

The blended meat wave continues – and this time for kids. Colorado startup Teton Waters Ranch has rolled out its Taste Buds range, which combines vegetables with beef. The Meatball Buddies, Burger Buddies, Mini Corn Dogs, and Top Dog hot dogs are available at Whole Foods, Sprouts Farmers Market, Central Market, and New Seasons Market.

In a similar vein, vegan chicken maker Rebellyous Foods will soon offer its products in public schools in Chicago, as part of its larger strategy to up plant protein presence in school lunches.

Dairy giant Bel Group has introduced the vegan versions of its The Laughing Cow snacking cheese to the Canadian market, which will be available at major retailers like Metro, Loblaws, and Real Canadian Superstore.

Courtesy: Malk

US alt-milk maker Malk Organics has added three creamers to its lineup, priced at $7.99 per 16oz bottle. The lightly sweetened SKU has an oat base, while the vanilla and caramel flavours are almond-based. They’ll be available at Sprouts and select stores of Whole Foods, Erewhon, Fresh Thyme and other retailers from mid-June.

Speaking of milk, UK brand Oato is making its move onto the shelves of Waitrose, following a listing with northwest supermarket Booths for its fresh oat milk in February.

Danish player Naturli’, meanwhile, has secured a listing with Tesco, the UK’s largest supermarket, for its vegan block and spreadable butters.

Months after acquiring La Fauxmagerie, UK plant-based pizzeria Purezza has opened the vegan cheesemonger in its Camden store, with over 40 cheeses and the cult-favourite cheese cellar in the basement.

Courtesy: Shicken

Also in the UK, Shicken has updated its entire range of meat analogues from a soy and wheat protein base to an allergen-free pea recipe, with its existing products set to be phased out by the end of the month. The new iteration of its tikka kebabs is already out at Costco.

As it aims to make half its menu meatless by next year, Wagamama has introduced four dishes with Australian startup Fable Food‘s pulled shiitake mushrooms – this entails gyoza, otsumami, soba noodles and a koyo bowl.

In its efforts to address food waste, Unilever has redesigned its squeeze bottle for the Hellmann’s vegan mayo with an edible plant-based coating that prevents the spread from sticking to the sides and minimises the amount left over after use. The new packaging will be debuted in the UK and Ireland this year.

In France, plant-based meat leader Heura is running a pop-up vegan butchery at E-Leclerc hypermarkets. It started at Saint-Brice-Courcelles (May 21-25), is now at the Levallois-Perret location (May 28 to June 1), and will end in the neighbouring Clichy store (June 3-8).

Courtesy: HappyVore/Green Queen

Fellow French startup HappyVore has introduced a first-of-its-kind plant-based meat range called Croq’Coulis. Inspired by chocolate fondants and mochi, these combine an outer crunchy layer of pea protein and vegetables with saucy fillings (aubergine-tomato, and carrot-sweet potato-coconut curry).

And Swedish furniture giant IKEA has brought its vegan hot dogs to Australia. Made from rice protein, carrots, onions and apples, they cost A$2.

Finance, research and company updates

Australian plant-based meat maker Proform Foods, which retails under the Meet brand, has fallen into administration, appointing KPMG to manage the company. It continues to trade for now.

Dutch cultivated meat producer Meatable, which recently hosted a public tasting of its pork in the Netherlands ahead of its impending regulatory approval in Singapore, has appointed Jeff Tripician as CEO, with co-founder Krijn de Nood continuing in his board position. The move comes as part of the company’s plans to expand in the US following its Singapore launch.

Courtesy: Meatable

Danish vegan cheese startup Færm has received follow-on funding through a €1.3M convertible loan from research firm BioInnovation Institute‘s Venture House programme.

Canada’s alternative protein economic cluster Protein Industries Canada has invested C$2.6M in a project to expand the lupin protein market alongside Lupin Platform, PURIS Holdings and YOSO Canada, who will provide the rest of the funding in the C$6.2M initiative.

Meat analogues will be the largest driver of the global incremental volume of protein ingredients, which are set to reach 860 kilotonnes by 2027, according to Swiss research company Giract.

Analysis by Japanese news outlet Nikkei has revealed that the country has the second-highest value of alternative protein patents, behind only the US. It’s followed by Switzerland and China.

Courtesy: Crackd

British plant-based liquid egg maker Crackd has launched a ‘love it or your money back’ guarantee to encourage people to try its product. The startup has sold the equivalent of three million eggs since its 2020 launch.

Fellow British company Tate & Lyle has handed over its remaining 49.7% share in US plant-based producer Primient to KPS Capital Ventures, which will own 100% of the company once the transaction is completed (expected by the end of July).

Policy and manufacturing updates

Meat giant Maple Leaf Foods, which merged its animal and plant protein businesses in February, has announced the decision to close a production facility in Brantford, Canada to consolidate manufacturing in its existing network.

Food giant GEA has broken ground on a new technology centre for plant-based, microbial and cultivated proteins. Scheduled to open next year, it aims to help food manufacturers meet the demand for alternative proteins, while creating future-resilient jobs and local economic opportunities.

In India, the CSIR-National Institute for Interdisciplinary Science and Technology has signed a deal with Kerala’s Alter Wave Eco Innovations to tap its vegan leather manufacturing technology, using sources like pineapple leaves, banana stems, and rice straws.

Courtesy: Oatly

Finally, ahead of the EU elections from June 6-9, Oatly and Patagonia have joined forces to build voter engagement, imploring business leaders to encourage employees to vote. They’re giving staff time off to vote, providing them with informative resources, and giving parliamentarians a manifesto for climate-friendly policies.

Check out last week’s Future Food Quick Bites.

The post Future Food Quick Bites: Vegan Indian, EU Elections & Squeezy Mayo appeared first on Green Queen.

This post was originally published on Green Queen.
May 27, 2024

UK to Evaluate Novel Foods Based on Track Record of Regulatory Approval in Other Countries

5 Mins Read
The UK’s Food Standards Agency is set to announce plans to introduce a “sliding scale” mechanism for the regulatory approval of novel foods, which will take into account products’ track record internationally.

As regulation around cultivated meat progresses rapidly internationally, the UK doesn’t want to be left out. For a long time, it retained the pre-Brexit novel food regulations of the EU, but recent efforts have sought to speed up and simplify the process.

In its latest move, it seems the Food Standards Agency – the country’s food safety regulator – is looking towards a system of international cooperation for novel foods like cultivated meat, precision-fermented foods, insect protein, and CBD products, according to the Grocer.

Set to be announced next month, it will involve a “sliding scale of international engagement” to clear the highly congested docket of applications, which currently face a two-and-a-half-year waiting period. This would mean that the UK could approve cultivated meat and other novel foods based on their track records in other countries.

“As the UK regulator, we’ve been in touch with colleagues in Singapore, colleagues in Australia, New Zealand, and all over the world,” the FSA’s deputy director of regulatory services, Peter Quigley, told a forum in Westminster.

“We have to be careful about naming specific countries where we may have a free trade agreement with them or may not. And so we probably aren’t going to set up a shopping list of the top five people we want to pick up the phone to,” he added. “It’s more having a framework of how we’d engage.”

UK proposal may not include EU regulator

Courtesy: Ivy Farm Technologies

There are at least 470 novel food dossiers awaiting regulatory approval in the UK right now, which has made it nearly impossible for companies with new products waiting to go to market. But the FSA’s new proposal would allow for both regulatory agreements between countries, and for approvals to be written into trade agreements with other nations.

However, experts say the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), is absent in the list of potential collaborators. The EU regulator has an infamously complex regulatory framework, which has driven companies away from the region to launch their products in more open markets.

“Currently, EFSA is not open to discussions with the FSA. All of which would tend to suggest that while there might be greater recognition of international approvals, this will not, most likely initially, include EU approvals,” a source told the Grocer.

Rich Dillon, CEO of British cultivated meat startup Ivy Farm Technologies, said: “The FSA seems to be trying to be more nimble and aligning with countries that have good regulatory practice, which would save a huge amount of time,” he said. “You’ve got brilliant scientists in different countries doing the same amount of work on the same products. It makes sense to cooperate, and it already happens in other industries.”

Ivy Farm itself has filed dossiers for regulatory approval, but it hasn’t disclosed where. “Ivy Farm has high hopes to achieve regulatory approvals in a number of regions in the not-too-distant future,” Dillon told Green Queen last week, after the company co-hosted a public tasting of its cultivated beef in Iceland, following a manufacturing agreement in Finland.

One source told the Grocer that the UK’s slow pace has left it trailing behind nations like Singapore, the US and Israel, all of whom have approved cultivated meat for sale. “This should have been done a while ago,” they said. “This could have been a way of outsourcing some of the resources needed and we wish it had happened directly after Brexit.”

Novel food regulation high on FSA agenda

Courtesy: Vital Meat | Composite by Green Queen

The FSA’s work on novel food regulation has been accelerating of late, as the country aims to break away from the pre-Brexit framework and become a leader in alternative proteins. In August, a report by think tank Green Alliance suggested that with the right combination of targeted investments and regulation, the UK’s alternative protein sector could be worth £6.8B annually and create 25,000 jobs by 2035.

Just last week, French cultivated chicken producer Vital Meat filed its dossier to the FSA and Food Standards Scotland. “British consumers’ pragmatism and environmental consciousness align well with the sustainability benefits of cultivated meat. Their receptiveness to innovation and health awareness further create a favourable environment,” Camille Chevalier, communications manager at Vital Meat, told Green Queen.

“Additionally, the British FSA is very proactive in facilitating the process,” she added, citing the regulator’s launch of a survey earlier this year, which asked manufacturers when they plan to submit applications for cultivated meat products, and what technologies they may be using. A 2023 Deloitte commissioned by the FSA suggested that speeding up novel foods regulation could help the UK meet its carbon reduction plans (it aims to reach net zero by 2050).

But while Vital Meat awaits approval (which will take 18 to 24 months), British startup Meatly may be on retail shelves within the next couple of months. It’s because, unlike Vital Meat, its product isn’t made for humans – it is selling tinned cultivated chicken for cats.

In March, the FSA declared it would create a new public register of regulated products, replacing the current system that requires the parliament to pass statutory instruments before they can be placed on the market. This added up to six months to the process, but following this, it would take up to two years to approve cultivated meat and other novel foods.

The food safety body will also remove the requirement for products that have already been approved to reapply for clearance every 10 years. “The board has been clear that overhauling the way we authorise new foods is an opportunity for the FSA to drive benefits for consumers by enabling new and innovative products that we assess as being safe to come to market more quickly,” said FSA chair professor Susan Jebb.

”One of the options we have asked officials to consider is the possibility of extending the way we work with regulators in other countries where we are aligned in the safety standards of foods,” she added. “This could involve greater sharing of information or technical expertise as we assess the potential risks, whilst maintaining autonomy over decision-making.”

Israel’s Aleph Farms (already approved in its home country for cultivated beef) also applied for the UK greenlight back in August, while Dutch startup Mosa Meat is eyeing the UK too.

The post UK to Evaluate Novel Foods Based on Track Record of Regulatory Approval in Other Countries appeared first on Green Queen.

This post was originally published on Green Queen.
May 22, 2024

Future Food Quick Bites: Vegan Doner Kebabs, Wild Salmon & Mayor Battles

5 Mins Read
In our weekly column, we round up the latest news and developments in the alternative protein and sustainable food industry. This week, Future Food Quick Bites covers Revo Foods’ new salmon analogue a new vegan doner kebab, and Good Eating Company’s impact report on plant-based nudges.

New products and launches

German startup Revo Foods has updated its plant-based smoked salmon. The new SKU, called Smokey Slices, has higher omega-3 fatty acid content than some conventional salmon products, and is said to be the first plant-based alternative to wild salmon on the market. It comes in original and dill-lemon variants.

Courtesy: Revo Foods

In the US, frozen food giant Dr. Praeger’s will roll out two new snack SKUs – Southwestern Black Bean Crunchy Stars and BBQ Black Bean & Sweet Potato Slider Patties – at 475 Target stores. It has also added a Smoky Chipotle Sweet Potato Burger exclusively at Costco.

California’s Oobli, which recently earned FDA approval for its Oubli-fruit-derived precision-fermented sugar alternative, has established its first B2B partnership, with Mexican food manufacturer Grupo Bimbo set to launch products with the sweet protein by the end of 2024 or the start of next year.

At the National Restaurant Association show in Chicago, local startup Land Lovers showcased Land Lovers X, a concept born out of a link-up with AI-driven kitchen solutions provider Botinkit, which will use robotics to produce the company’s vegan steak.

Ahead of World Ocean Month (June), The Plant-Based Seafood Co has expanded its collaboration with PLNT Burger to unveil a Crab Cake Sandwich using the former’s Mind Blown crab cake at locations in New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Washington DC, Maryland, and Virginia.

Fellow US startup Barvecue has earned a listing at Whole Foods, which will see its vegan Pulled BVQ and Carnitas in the retailer’s freezers nationwide.

Courtesy: RollinGreens

Shark Tank success RollinGreens has unveiled a line of shelf-stable vegan ready meals, all of which contain rice and plant-based meat in classic, teriyaki, Mexican or stir-fry variants. The startup received a $500,000 investment by Robert Herjavec for a 20% stake on the show in 2020.

Dutch alt-dairy producer Boermarke has developed a new range of vegan cheese with added vitamins and 10% protein. Available in Gouda, Cumin, and Mediterranean flavours, the Vairy slices will be launched at select European retailers in June.

In the UK, free-from brand Crave has introduced vegan and gluten-free frozen doughnuts that can be cooked in air fryers in five minutes. Called Dodoughs, they’ll be in Sainsbury’s and Morrisons freezers from June 2.

London-based Better Nature has scaled up the distribution of its tempeh products at Tesco and Asda, reaching a total of 1,000 stores among the retailers after a 250% annual sales growth.

Courtesy: German Doner Kebab

And fast-casual chain German Doner Kebab has launched its first plant-based option in the UK, in partnership with Nestlé Professional. The new product is called OV Kebab and replaces pulled chicken with a soy-based doner.

Policy and finance developments

In New Zealand, Daisy Lab has received approval from the country’s Environmental Protection Agency to build its first pilot facility for precision-fermented dairy proteins and scale up production to 5,000 litres.

Also in the precision fermentation world, Chicago’s Hydrosome Labs has developed a natural, chemical-free process to customise yeast and/or bacteria to produce specific molecules for use in a variety of applications using the tech, helping address yield and cost bottlenecks.

Courtesy: Lancaster University

In the UK, the Lancaster University Students’ Union has voted for a transition to a fully plant-based menu on-campus dining services, with a 50% target for 2025, followed by a 100% shift by 2027.

On the contrary, Worcester City’s new Liberal Democrat mayor Mel Alcott has reversed her predecessor’s decision to remove meat from the council’s receptions. In February, Green Party’s Louis Stephen had taken the measure to highlight the climate impact of animal agriculture.

German alt-seafood company BettaF!sh has joined the EU-wide FunSea research project to advance the nutritional quality of cultivated brown and green seaweed and develop novel food products over a three-year period.

Courtesy: Actual Veggies

Whole-food plant-based company Actual Veggies has brought in a seven-figure sum in a new round of funding, and will soon expand its products’ retail footprint, with the business now profitable.

Research and company updates

A major review of 49 studies spanning 23 years has shown that vegan and vegetarian diets have a robust link to better health, with reduced risk of heart disease, and gastrointestinal and prostate cancer. Plant-based diets were found to have significant health benefits.

Israeli alternative protein startup Steakholder Foods has partnered with Taiwan’s Industrial Technology Research Institute to develop and commercialise foods using the former’s 3D-printing tech and plant-based premises tailored for Taiwanese cuisine.

Courtesy: Steakholder Foods

Thailand-based CP Foods has received a Crystal Taste Award for its Meat Zero Chicken Nuggets, a recognition awarded for earning a three-star rating for three consecutive years.

Contract caterer Good Eating Company and behavioural science firm Greener by Default have released an impact report for their initiative to nudge plant-based choices. Switching to an oat milk default decreased dairy consumption from 70-18% at one site, while 74% of Good Eating Company’s menu is now meatless.

Speaking of health, Beyond Meat CEO Ethan Brown has called for more unity in the plant-based meat sector, suggesting the divide between whole foods and ultra-processed foods is hurting the industry and further driving the meat sector’s misinformation campaign against it.

Courtesy: Beyond Meat

Finally, Beyond Meat has also suffered setbacks in its foodservice footprint, with Carl’s Jr taking the Beyond Burger off the menu from its 1,000+ locations, and Del Taco removing the meat analogues from its nearly 600 sites, citing low sales. However, the latter is exploring other plant-based dishes with Beyond Meat.

Check out last week’s Future Food Quick Bites.

The post Future Food Quick Bites: Vegan Doner Kebabs, Wild Salmon & Mayor Battles appeared first on Green Queen.

This post was originally published on Green Queen.
May 20, 2024

Vital Meat Files for UK Regulatory Approval of Cultivated Chicken, Targets 2025 Launch

5 Mins Read
French startup Vital Meat has submitted a dossier to food regulators in England and Scotland for its cultivated chicken, a process that’s expected to take 18 to 24 months.

France’s Vital Meat, which makes cultivated chicken as a B2B ingredient for hybrid meats, has applied for regulatory approval in the UK, making it one of only a handful of companies to do so.

The startup has submitted a novel food dossier to the Food Standards Agency (FSA) and Food Standards Scotland, whose scientists and experts will now assess the application in a process expected to last 18 months to two years.

The development comes six months after the cultivated chicken player filed for approval in Singapore too, with the green light from its regulator thought to be imminent.

“We can’t wait to start commercialisation in Great Britain; chicken is one of the most consumed meat over there,” said Vital Meat co-founder and CEO Etienne Duthoit. “We are now preparing our launch in 2025 and looking for food partners.”

Why Vital Meat chose the UK

Courtesy: Vital Meat

Vital Meat, which uses pharmaceutical technology to transform cells from fertilised chicken eggs into cultivated meat, expects to receive regulatory clearance in Singapore by the end of the year. “We are going through the questions and answers process with scientific experts from SFA and so far, the discussion is very smooth and is going well,” said Claude Rescan, the startup’s regulatory expert.

The company suggests this puts it “in the running” to be the first European startup to be approved for sale in the city-state, although Dutch cultivated pork producer Meatable is anticipating the go-ahead shortly.

“We are very confident and are already collaborating with a Singaporean chef as well as food companies to prepare for the market launch as soon as the approval is granted,” said Duthoit. This year, Singapore has already granted approval to Australia’s Vow, whose cultivated quail is now being unveiled at restaurants. And just last week, Eat Just (the world’s first company to be allowed to sell cultivated meat back in 2020, also in Singapore) introduced its Good Meat chicken in the freezer at Huber’s Butchery, marking the global retail debut of cultivated meat.

“The decision to expand into the UK swiftly follows our Singaporean endeavour. Asia, and particularly Singapore, is an important market for us with consumers that are open to new foods and a business ecosystem open to innovation,” said Vital Meat COO Olivia de Talancé.

As it awaited the SFA’s decision, Vital Meat wanted to expand to another market. It chose the UK due to its citizens’ pragmatism and climate consciousness aligning well with the sustainability aspects of cultivated meat, alongside their receptiveness to innovation and awareness around health.

But plenty of work needs to be done if manufacturers are to convince Brits to eat cultivated meat. A survey by the FSA in 2022 revealed that while 78% of consumers had heard of these proteins, only 34% would be willing to try them. Only three in 10 perceived cultivated meat to be safe to eat, and 42% said nothing would encourage them to consume these products. However, 27% would change their minds if they knew they were safe to eat, and 23% would do so if they could trust that they’re properly regulated.

Rapid progress for cultivated meat in the UK

Courtesy: Vital Meat

Vital Meat’s UK application is the latest development in a fast-moving sector. For years, the FSA was criticised for having a slow novel foods regulation process, which it inherited from the UK post-Brexit. But lately, things have begun to shift, and fast.

The regulator is seeking state investment to create labs for sandbox testing of novel foods, with an eye on the £5M scheme announced by UK chancellor Jeremy Hunt last autumn. In January, it was reported that the FSA has launched a survey asking manufacturers when they plan to submit applications for cultivated meat products, and what technologies they may be using. This followed a 2023 Deloitte study it commissioned, which suggested that speeding up novel foods regulation could help the UK meet its carbon reduction plans (it aims to reach net zero by 2050).

In March, the FSA agreed on plans to fast-track the commercialisation of novel foods. It said it would create a new public register of regulated products, replacing the current system that requires the parliament to pass statutory instruments before they can be placed on the market. This added up to six months to the process, which at the time took up to two-and-a-half years.

The FSA will also remove the requirement for products that have already been approved to reapply for clearance every 10 years. The reforms mean it will now take up to two years to approve cultivated meat for human consumption in the UK, as the new framework still requires thorough, evidence-based assessments of safety and nutrition.

Around the same time, British cultivated meat startup Meatly said it was expecting to receive the greenlight from the FSA within three months – but this is a chicken product for pets, not human consumption. Of producers working on the latter, only Israel’s Aleph Farms has publicly announced filing a dossier to the UK regulator (back in August). Dutch pioneer Mosa Meat, meanwhile, has laid out its intention to do the same.

“Health is of paramount importance to us. We are committed to not using antibiotics, or any other controversial ingredient, such as fetal bovine serum or any other animal product. That’s why we are confident that our commitment to safety and sustainability will be rewarded,” de Talancé said of Vital Meat’s UK application.

Courtesy: Vital Meat

The company partnered with cell culture media producer BioWest last year, whose customised serum-free media for Vital Meat allows the latter to manufacture its cultivated chicken in 250-litre bioreactors, capable of producing several kgs of product at a time. The collaboration has allowed the French startup to reduce costs, too, which is a crucial entry barrier for cultivated meat.

Cost is also why Vital Meat is choosing the hybrid approach, making cultivated chicken for manufacturers that can mix it with plant-based ingredients, instead of marketing a fully developed cut itself. Investors say this approach is the only way cultivated meat can be commercially viable in the near term – it’s the same reason why Eat Just’s latest Good Meat chicken comprises 97% plant-based ingredients.

In 2022, a 1,000-person poll suggested that 35% of UK consumers are open to trying a hybrid burger. Vital Meat, which plans to introduce white fish and pork in the future, will hope to build on these results soon.

The post Vital Meat Files for UK Regulatory Approval of Cultivated Chicken, Targets 2025 Launch appeared first on Green Queen.

This post was originally published on Green Queen.
May 20, 2024

Wanda Fish Develops Cultivated Bluefin Tuna Toro Sashimi, Plans to File Regulatory Dossiers in 2025

8 Mins Read
Israeli cultivated seafood startup Wanda Fish has developed hybrid toro sashimi, the highly prized fatty cut of bluefin tuna belly, and plans to apply for regulatory approval next year.

To battle overfishing, extinction threats, ocean pollution, and increasing prices of an already pricey product, Wanda Fish has created cultivated toro sashimi, the fatty underbelly of bluefin tuna known for its buttery, tender characteristics.

Made from cultivated bluefin tuna cells developed with a 3D plant-based matrix, the hybrid product aims to take on the same sensory and nutritional attributes of its wild-sourced counterpart, which can go for as much as $100 for a 1kg serving.

Armed with its patent-pending technology, whole-cut downstream manufacturing process, and a $7M in seed investment in October, Wanda Fish is now preparing to commercialise its cultivated seafood, with regulatory applications planned for 2025. These efforts will be supported by its upcoming Series A round, which will help the startup fine-tune its product and scale up production.

“We are still at lab-scale production. Nevertheless, we are planning our manufacturing process, which will support our goals for this stage,” Wanda Fish CEO Daphna Heffetz, who founded the company in 2021 as a joint venture with The Kitchen FoodTech Hub, tells Green Queen.

Tackling scalability and high costs is also why Heffetz and her team chose to develop a premium seafood filet – bluefin tuna is one of the most expensive seafood products, priced well above land-based livestock. “This would enable us to build a solid business model, start commercial activities without committing to large-scale and expensive operations, and grow with the growth of the category and product sales,” Heffetz explains.

Why Wanda Fish picked bluefin tuna toro

Courtesy: Noam Priesman

Bluefin tuna is a highly sought-after seafood delicacy, thanks to its velvety texture, buttery flavour and nutritional attributes. But this species represents the ocean’s fastest and longest-distance swimmers, which makes them difficult to raise in captivity, thus commanding a higher price and its use in high-grade sushi and sashimi.

But its supply is limited and extremely variable in quality, and its stocks face declines due to overfishing and illegal, unregulated and unreported fishing. But continued demand is driving the species towards endangerment and has prompted governments to place strict quotas to limit its fishing. Plus, tuna is one of the most polluted fish in the oceans, often contaminated with plastic debris and extremely high levels of heavy metals like mercury.

This is why cultivated seafood producers like BlueNalu (US) and Wanda Fish are hoping to provide a solution to the volatility and unsustainability of bluefin tuna toro. The latter combines the cellular mass of muscle and fat created from tuna cells, which are co-developed with a plant-based matrix.

“An important element of our product, same as wild-caught fillets, consists of muscle, fat and connective tissues,” says Heffetz. “The tuna cell biomass is then mixed with a plant-based matrix to form a whole cut. As the product is aimed to be served raw, same as the wild-caught sashimi, we developed an easy-to-scale and cost-effective technology to create our 3D fillet, which allows us to serve the product raw.”

The fatty part of the whole-cut bluefin tuna provides not just the textural characteristics it’s cherished for, but also essential nutrients like proteins and omega-3 fatty acids. Wanda Fish’s process induces native fat formulation in the tuna cells, with the team focusing on achieving the same level of fat marbling as conventional toro sashimi. The scalability of the platform will allow the company to get closer to price parity and maximise its profit margins for the premium product, according to Heffetz.

“Cultivated bluefin tuna is one of those rare food products that make good business sense,” says Yaron Sfadyah, VP of business development and marketing. “It is in high demand, with limited alternatives that match the taste and texture of the wild fish, and at an ideal price point and distribution model. Alternative protein companies often contend with high manufacturing costs, coupled with the low price of animal-based products. It is a completely different story for cultivated bluefin tuna.”

Going the hybrid meat route

Courtesy: Noam Priesman

One major way of reducing costs for cultivated meat currently is to simply use less of it in the product. Known as hybrid meat, this approach of blending cultivated cells with plant-based ingredients is favoured by several companies. Most prominently, Eat Just – the world’s first cultivated meat startup to be approved for sale – last week launched its latest Good Meat chicken product for retail in Singapore, which contained just 3% of cultivated chicken.

“It’s no secret that the main challenge the entire cultivated food sector faces is high manufacturing costs at scale. And we don’t have time to spare, as demand for seafood products – specifically bluefin tuna – is constantly rising,” says Heffetz.

“We believe hybrid products that include muscles, fat and connective tissue biomass grown from fish cells will offer a delicious and nutritional product to market and satisfy consumers. We are a food company, basing our food on cutting-edge technology, and as such our mission is to supply a delicious and wholesome product that will also do good for our world – and so the question is: ‘What formulation will result in the best product to satisfy consumers?’” she adds.

While she hasn’t disclosed the exact composition of the product, Heffetz explains that the company aims to have a “significant percentage of cultivated vs plant-based” in its products. “We believe it’s a question of product viability, not science or the ‘race’ to reach a certain figure,” she suggests. “The aim in this first prototype was to develop the right technique of mixing the two components while maintaining the characteristics of the wild-caught. To test that, we did use a significant portion of mixed cultivated cells, but the majority is still plant-based.”

Asia a key focus for Wanda Fish

Courtesy: Noam Priesman

Wanda Fish will introduce the toro at high-end seafood restaurants, with a focus on Japanese cuisine, including sushi and sashimi. “When you look at the ideal distribution channels for cultivated bluefin tuna, premium seafood restaurant makes a lot of sense, which is one of the greatest market attributes of this product, and why we think we stand at a different potential and feasibility than other cultivated food products,” says Heffetz. “Thus, we are planning to start selling in limited quantities in 2026, reaching price parity soon after.”

Its initial target markets are countries with the right combination of consumer acceptance, suitable regulatory frameworks, and government support. Heffetz earmarks Israel, the US and Asia as potential entry points. Within Asia, she pinpoints Singapore, South Korea and Japan as the most promising markets, both from a product perspective and in terms of their openness to novel foods.

Singapore is already known to be a pioneer in novel food regulation – it was the first to allow the sale of cultivated meat, and approved another company earlier this year. South Korea, meanwhile, has established its regulatory process and created a regulation-free zone to accelerate commercialisation – one local company is targeting a launch next year.

And in Japan, there is more clarity now about the regulatory framework, though it has become slightly more complex – this could be a crucial country for Wanda Fish, given it accounts for 80% of global bluefin tuna consumption.

“We need to monitor these developments as we decide which country has a better path forward,” says Heffetz, who is especially excited about Asia. “Just look at the number of alternative seafood products that are being introduced to Asian consumers, many of which are introduced by Asian multinational, giant food companies, whether it is in Japan, Korea, Thailand, or elsewhere,” she points out.

Sailing through financial and legislative pressure

Courtesy: Noam Priesman

Alternative seafood has been facing its own headwinds recently – earlier this year, Germany’s Ordinary Seafood and San Francisco’s New Wave Foods both ceased operations, citing a bleak funding landscape and market challenges, while Californian cultivated seafood player Finless Foods reportedly initiated a second round of layoffs in less than 12 months.

However, Heffetz remains upbeat. “When we look at the data, the deals and investments that took place in recent years, we actually see that seafood is keeping its pace, or is not as hurting as the alternative meat sector,” she suggests, adding: “The alternative seafood sector is much smaller than the meat sector, and thus its growth potential is huge. This is also why I feel strongly about this field – we have yet to showcase the real potential, and we are encouraged by the level of support and interest we are seeing from companies, CVCs and VCs around the world.”

And speaking of challenges, the cultivated meat sector has been at the centre of legislative action recently. Italy has already banned the production and sale of these products – and this month, the US states of Florida and Alabama have done the same. Several other countries and American states are considering similar bans or restrictions.

Heffetz believes these bans are more reflective of the local political climate than the industry or its potential. “Cultivated food will require additional research and work, and even then, it will take years to challenge the large animal-origin food companies. We can look at plant-based as an interesting case study,” she says.

“At the end of the day, whether we like it or not, our world and our future are at risk, and this is a step to mitigate that risk. As I see it, we are developing another offering to stand side by side with plant-based, animal-based, cultivated, fermentation, and who knows what [else] the future may bring to our plates.”

The post Wanda Fish Develops Cultivated Bluefin Tuna Toro Sashimi, Plans to File Regulatory Dossiers in 2025 appeared first on Green Queen.

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May 20, 2024

Ivy Farm Targets 2025 Cultivated Meat Launch After Deal to Produce at World’s ‘Largest’ Alt-Protein Facility

5 Mins Read
UK food tech startup Ivy Farm has inked a manufacturing partnership to scale up at a new alternative protein facility in Finland. After hosting a tasting of its cultivated beef yesterday, it’s aiming to launch its first sales next year.

British cultivated meat producer Ivy Farm Technologies has announced a major manufacturing partnership with Finnish biotech firm Synbio Powerlabs Oy, which will see the former demonstrate the scalability of its mammalian cells in food-grade fermenters at the latter’s new production plant.

Synbio Powerlabs is converting a large Finnish food-grade facility into a multipurpose hub for cultivated meat and fermentation-derived proteins, backed by a €2.99M government grant. Slated to go live early next year, it will feature pilot-scale equipment and production scales at 10,000 and 27,000 litres, with six 250,000-litre manufacturing vessels. This will make it the largest such facility in the world, according to the announcement.

Ivy Farm will have exclusivity in the cultivated meat section of the hub, and will be able to gain a strategic advantage, reduce capital expenditure costs, and mitigate risks linked to scaling up. The next phase of the partnership will focus on tech transfer and expanding production to 10,000-litre fermenters, with further plans to increase manufacturing in the next few years.

It would be a major step up in the Oxford-based producer’s plans to commercialise its cultivated beef – its current pilot plant can produce up to three tonnes of product annually, but this facility is used for process development rather than continuous production. “The partnership with Synbio is designed to progress the production steps to larger scales and test what is possible all done in a low capex way,” Ivy Farm CEO Richard Dillon told Green Queen.

A ‘unique’ facility powered by renewable energy

Courtesy: Synbio Powerlabs

The new plant, located near Helsinki, is dedicated to helping alternative protein companies accelerate their routes to market. The Nordics are home to some of the most innovative players in this space. While these countries are high importers of meat, the abundance of renewable energy and tech expertise makes them primed to capitalise on the novel foods sector.

“With the support of Clingate Oy and the Finnish government, we are proud to lead the charge in transforming our vision into reality, positioning ourselves as a global leader in food innovation,” said Synbio Powerlabs chairman Alejandro Antalich. “Together with Ivy Farm Technologies, we are committed to pushing the boundaries of what is possible and shaping the future of food.”

Speaking about the partnership with Ivy Farm, he added: “By converging our cutting-edge technology and innovative thinking, we are not only revolutionising the way meat is produced but also paving the way for a more efficient, scalable, and environmentally friendly approach to mass-scale food production.”

Dillon said the company was “committed to partnering with fermentation experts and licensing our technology” to speed up the commercialisation of cultivated meat globally.

Asked why the startup chose Finland as a hub, he said: “There is no facility similar to this in the UK, so we were forced to look outside of the UK.” He called Synbio Powerlabs “real experts in fermentation”, explaining that Finland “has a strong track record in supporting technology and sustainability”.

“Finland is second in Europe when it comes to renewable energy share [behind neighbouring Sweden]. The Synbio Powerlab facility is using power from a very efficient and sustainable Finnish energy system that is almost 70% renewable,” he said. “The facility and the tanks are multipurpose for different fermentation processes,” he added, outlining that the startup “has the possibilities to use all fermentation equipment in the future”.

“Producing cultivated beef in this facility at the metrics expected would produce delicious and nutritious meat with potential savings of 92% GHG emissions, 90% less land and 66% less freshwater versus current industrial farming,” he added. The total production time from the cell thawing to harvesting tonnes of meat is two to three weeks, versus two to three years to produce the same tonnage of meat via current bovine pregnancy and farming methods.”

Fellow British startup Eternal, which makes fungi-based Mycofood is one of the other companies that will be making use of the new facility, with other businesses to be announced in the future.

Ivy Farm files for regulatory approval, targets 2025 launch

Courtesy: Ivy Farm Technologies

The partnership was unveiled at Iceland Innovation Week yesterday, where Ivy Farm hosted the country’s second-ever cultivated meat tasting with local startup ORF Genetics, which produced recombinant growth factors for these proteins. In February, the latter co-hosted a public tasting with Australia’s Vow, whose cultivated quail is now approved and on sale in Singapore.

Ivy Farm’s public tasting itself follows an event hosted by Fortnum and Mason in London, which previewed a scotch egg that featured the former’s cultivated Angus beef in the form of meatballs. The Iceland tasting was attended by government officials and food and tech leaders, with the beef cooked by Ólafur Örn Ólafsson, owner and head chef of fine-dining eatery Brút.

“I couldn’t believe how enjoyable it was to work with cultivated beef, which is essentially just meat grown using new technology. In fact, it would be very difficult or even impossible for most foodies to distinguish between the cultivated beef and traditionally grown,” the restauranteur said.

“Our primary focus is on premium cultivated beef, specifically Wagyu and Aberdeen Angus mince meat,” said Dillon. Ivy Farm is focusing on a B2B approach, which may mean its cultivated beef ends up in a hybrid product with plant-based ingredients, or even mixed with conventional meat.

“We supply to food companies who already are experts in making and branding final meat products, such as burgers, meatballs and other delicious products from minced meat,” he explained. “Some may choose to combine with their existing meat products and some may combine with plant-based products. The food companies have the best consumer and customer insights, so will make good final product choices for their markets.”

Dillon confirmed that Ivy Farm has filed dossiers for regulatory approval, though he remained tight-lipped about the timeline or country. “Ivy Farm has high hopes to achieve regulatory approvals in a number of regions in the not-too-distant future,” he said.

In March, the company collaborated with BSF Enterprise (parent of cellular agriculture business 3D Bio-Tissues) to fundraise, launch and scale its cultivated meat in Asia. “We have engaged BSF, a technology specialist company, [which] is familiar and networked in Hong Kong, China and the broader Asia region to help us assess a number of enquiries from Asian companies to potentially license our technology and/or invest in the scale-up development work we have planned,” said Dillon.

So when can we expect to see a product containing Ivy Farm’s cultivated beef? “2025 is going to be an exciting time for us as we look to scale and get first sales,” said Dillon.

The post Ivy Farm Targets 2025 Cultivated Meat Launch After Deal to Produce at World’s ‘Largest’ Alt-Protein Facility appeared first on Green Queen.

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May 16, 2024

Simple Planet Eyes 2025 Regulatory Approval in South Korea After $8M Government Grant for Cultivated Meat

4 Mins Read
Korean food tech startup Simple Planet has received ₩11B ($8.1M) for a government project to boost food security, and targets regulatory approval for its cultivated meat ingredients next year.

South Koreans could be eating cultivated meat as soon as next year, with Seoul-based Simple Planet gearing up to file for regulatory approval in the country, months after it began inviting applications for the same.

“Simple Planet is applying for regulatory approval from the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety, aiming for approval in the first half of next year,” co-founder and CEO Dominic Jeong told Green Queen. The company will sell products under its Balboa Kitchen brand.

“Consumers will be able to taste or receive prototypes in the second half of next year. The target markets include not only Korea, but also North America and Southeast Asia.”

The development comes after Simple Planet was selected for a ₩11B ($8.1M) grant by the government, led by the Korea Institute of Planning and Evaluation for Technology in Food, Agriculture and Forestry (IPET), Korea Agriculture Technology Promotion Agency (KOAT), and Korea Institute of Marine Science and Technology Promotion (KIMST).

The funding is dedicated towards a project that aims to develop the food tech sector in South Korea to bolster sustainable and stable food production in the future. Simple Planet, which makes ingredients for cultivated meat like powders and fats, will use the capital to further expand its R&D and commercialisation processes.

Simple Planet working on 13 cell lines

Courtesy: Simple Planet

The project durations differ based on the department. The KOAT initiative will focus on creating cultivated foods to replace animal-derived ingredients and last three years. Under the IPET, also a three-year project, it will work on establishing pluripotent stem cell lines and differentiation and developing mass culture technology for cultivated meat. The KIMST-backed project, meanwhile, is five years long and centres on R&D and production of high-value cultivated seafood.

“Simple Planet’s expertise in cell separation, proliferation/differentiation, and large-scale production through suspension culture has been a key factor in the selection process,” said Jeong. The company was recognised for its cell acquisition technology and suspended cell development platform, the establishment of 13 different specialised cell lines, and the development of serum-free media for cultivated meat.

Instead of making fully developed cuts of meat, Simple Planet is producing protein powders and unsaturated fatty acid pastes for cultivated meat products. “The focus is on cattle, pigs and chickens for livestock, and eel, halibut, rainbow trout, bluefin tuna, squid, pollack and lobster for seafood,” said Jeong. But he added: “There are plans to produce whole cuts in the future.”

The company is also working on duck, flatfish, salmon, king crab and oyster cell lines, and has plans to create a fish cake and seafood powder in the future.

“Our cell-cultured food ingredients can produce diverse customised ingredients including food and functional ingredients with excellent production efficiency, enabling a stable food supply,” said Jeong.

Cultivated meat developments escalating in South Korea

Courtesy: Simple Planet

The startup has bagged over $7.5M in funding to date, following a $6M pre-Series A round earlier this year. It has six bioreactors of varying sizes, with a total capacity of 1,150 litres. It’s currently building an 18,000 sq ft facility in (expected to be operational by 2025) – but Simple Planet has massive scale-up ambitions, with plans to start producing in Singapore, Thailand, India and the US by the end of 2025, with a targeted capacity of 20,000 litres.

Scaling up will help the company bring costs down, an effort that has been facilitated by its switch to food-grade media from fetal bovine serum. This could potentially reduce its production costs by 99.8%, from $430 to $1.5 per litre. “The current production cost is around ₩200,000/kg [$148] and the consumer price is set at ₩70,000/kg [$52],” said Jeong. “The plan is to reduce the cost through process technology development.”

This is crucial if cultivated meat is to take off in the country, with only 12% of Koreans willing to pay ₩1,000-3,000 (74 cents to $2.2) more per 100g of cultivated meat. On the contrary, 57% would eat cultivated pork if it’s cheaper than its conventional counterpart, and 25% would do so for beef too.

Speaking of taking off, cultivated meat has gained rapid momentum in the country. In February, the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety established a framework for regulatory approval of these proteins. The process costs ₩45M ($34,000) and is expected to take up to 270 working days.

And last month, the government created a regulatory-free special zone designed for the development of cultivated foods in the eastern province of Gyeongsangbuk-do. It harbours 10 startups that are working towards the commercialisation of cultivated meat.

Additionally, the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries announced this month that it will invest ₩28.6B ($21M) in research funding for its plant-based and cultivated seafood tech. “Simple Planet’s view is that the high-value marine species will become easily accessible to consumers, and the project is seen as a necessary investment for the future, as it can replace endangered species,” said Jeong.

The post Simple Planet Eyes 2025 Regulatory Approval in South Korea After $8M Government Grant for Cultivated Meat appeared first on Green Queen.

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May 16, 2024

Eat Just Debuts Cultivated Meat in Retail at Singapore’s Huber’s Butchery

7 Mins Read
Californian cultivated meat pioneer Eat Just has hit a major milestone in the sector, debuting Good Meat chicken in the freezers of Huber’s Butchery in Singapore – the first time these proteins are available in retail.

You can now cook cultivated chicken at home, thanks to Eat Just’s landmark move into the freezers of Huber’s Butchery in Singapore, making it the first cultivated meat product to be sold for retail anywhere in the world.

As the first company to ever receive regulatory approval to sell cultivated meat, the Good Meat chicken has been available at various foodservice points in the island nation since 2020. But moving into retail is a major breakthrough for an industry that has so far struggled to manufacture enough product and keep costs down for such a rollout.

This has been enabled by the launch of the latest iteration of Eat Just’s chicken, titled Good Meat 3. It’s a lower-cost formulation comprised of fewer cultivated meat cells, going from 60-70% to just 3% of the product. The rest is made up of wheat and soy proteins, sunflower and coconut oils, natural flavours, modified food starch and soy lecithin, and comes seasoned with olive oil, salt and pepper.

Available in the freezer section of Huber’s Butchery – which previously sold the product as part of several dishes – the shredded chicken is priced at S$7.20 ($5.35) for a 120g pack. “This format gives the best texture and versatility for home chefs to prepare in a wide variety of dishes,” Eat Just CEO Josh Tetrick tells Green Queen when asked about the meat cut.

“Giving consumers the opportunity to buy cultivated chicken in-store and bring it home to prepare and serve to their families is a huge step towards normalising this new type of food,” he says, revealing that a retail launch has been a goal from the start.

Switching up the hybrid composition to lower costs

Courtesy: Eat Just

The retail launch marks the debut of Good Meat 3, a new product crafted by Eat Just that could potentially end up as a foodservice offering as well. It was produced at ESCO Aster (the world’s first regulator-approved contract manufacturer for cultivated meat), while the extrusion process was completed at Nurasa’s newly unveiled Food Tech Innovation Centre, another Eat Just partner.

By retuning the composition to use a smaller percentage of cultivated meat, the startup is now able to sell its chicken at retail-friendly costs, which is a major step towards the commercialisation of the sector. Hybrid meats – which combine cultivated animal cells with plant-based ingredients – have been described by investors as the only way to make cultivated meat commercially feasible.

Heather Courtney, general partner at Alwyn Capital, told Green Queen in December: “The chances of being able to economically produce 100% cultivated products that can compete on price with commoditised meat are slim to none in the next 10+ years.”

But equally crucial to the success of these meats is the taste factor – it’s what attracted consumers to Good Meat too. A survey of diners at Huber’s Bistro suggested that buying and eating cultivated the cultivated chicken “significantly boosted” people’s acceptance of it. On a scale of 1 to 5, respondents displayed a strong willingness to try it again (a score of 4.41) and rated its flavour 4.21/5.

Eat Just – which has reduced production costs by 90% since 2018 – promises that despite the change in formulation, Good Meat 3 does not compromise on flavour, texture or nutrition. According to sensory testing, consumers find the product exceptional in taste, texture, and appearance. “Our initial sensory data has yielded overwhelmingly positive feedback on taste and texture, and we’re excited to see how home chefs will use GOOD Meat 3 in their favourite recipes,” says Tetrick. This indicated that “consumers will agree that it tastes like conventional chicken”.

The Good Meat chicken is also nutritionally on par with conventional chicken, and superior in some aspects. Per 100g, it delivers 28.6g of protein, 5.75 of fat (1.9g of which is saturated), 5.7mg of cholesterol, and 2.2g of fibre.

The retail rollout – combined with the lower price – will effect a major propulsion of sales for the company. “To date, we’ve sold more than 2,000 servings of GOOD Meat in Singapore alone, and with the introduction of GOOD Meat 3, we will sell more than that in 2024,” outlines Tetrick.

Cultivated meat gains ground in Singapore

Courtesy: Eat Just

The launch coincides with the reopening of Huber’s Butchery, which has undergone an extensive renovation. Starting today, Singaporeans can buy frozen cultivated chicken for the remainder of 2024. “Huber’s Butchery has been a true partner and advocate for Good Meat for over a year, and we are thrilled to continue working with them on this historic launch,” Tetrick says.

“Having the latest version of Good Meat 3 cultivated chicken available for retail is another step in this journey to make cultivated meat available to a bigger audience,” says Andre Huber, executive director of Huber’s. “People will have the opportunity to prepare the product the way they want and experience how it can fit into their home-cooked meals.”

Mirte Gosker, managing director at industry think tank the Good Food Institute APAC, adds: “The world will soon get its first look at what home chefs choose to do with cultivated meat when the choices are infinite. There’s no better place for this culinary exploration to happen than Singapore, which has a well-earned reputation as an epicentre of market testing thanks to its renowned food culture, multiethnic population, and outsize presence of world-class research facilities.”

It means that at present, there are two different cultivated meat products available to Singaporeans. In April, the country’s food safety regulator cleared Australia’s Vow to sell its cultivated quail, which has since been doing the rounds at restaurants – it’s currently on the menu at Tippling Club. Later this year, Dutch producer Meatable also expects to get the greenlight and launch its cultivated pork into foodservice.

But Eat Just, for now, remains the only company to put cultivated meat in retail freezers. “We know there is much more work to be done to prove that cultivated meat can be made at large scale, and we remain focused on that objective,” says Tetrick.

Contending with legal and political threats

Courtesy: Eat Just

The retail milestone comes as the cultivated meat startup faces various challenges in its home country. It has been embroiled in a $100M lawsuit with contract manufacturer ABEC over unpaid bills. Earlier this month, the judge in Pennsylvania sided with Eat Just on some matters, and ABEC on others. The case is still ongoing.

Meanwhile, the states of Florida and Alabama have banned cultivated meat this month, in a move widely panned by alternative protein experts, the press, and even the meat industry. This bill sends a terrible message to the investors, scientists, and entrepreneurs that have built America’s global leadership in alternative proteins,” Tom Rossmeissl, Eat Just’s global marketing head, told Green Queen after Florida’s ban.

“The law will not stop the development of cultivated meat,” he added. “And Good Meat remains committed to its mission: making real meat without needing to tear down a rainforest.”

Despite its financial troubles (the company has faced at least seven lawsuits since 2019) Tetrick has previously outlined Eat Just’s plans to break even in 2024. The startup, which has raised over $850M to date, earned 99.9% of its revenue from its vegan Just Egg business, as of November. “we are focused on the daily execution of our zero-burn plan (i.e., cover operating costs through margin dollars) and serving our customers. If we execute, the company and its missions win. It’ll be challenging and hard – and it’s up to us to get it done,” Tetrick told this publication at the time.

Now, he reiterates that target, explaining: “Eat Just is on track to achieve break-even by the end of 2024.” He adds that the company has no firm plans about foodservice at this point, but is “considering a variety of options to make our chicken available to wider audiences”. Its campaign-style production runs and rollouts have seen the Good Meat chicken appear on the menus of hawker stalls and fine-dining eateries in Singapore, as well as China Chilcano in Washington, DC.

Asked about Eat Just’s plans for 2024, Tetrick says: “We look forward to hearing feedback from Huber’s customers about GOOD Meat 3, and will use this input as we continue to make our product better.”

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This post was originally published on Green Queen.
May 10, 2024

MyriaMeat Develops Scaffold-Free Cultivated Pork Fillet, Plans Tasting Event Later This Year

4 Mins Read
German food tech startup MyriaMeat has unveiled a cultivated pork fillet made from 100% pork cells, without any scaffolds or plant proteins.

Months after emerging from stealth, German startup MyriaMeat has announced the successful development of a cultivated pork fillet made entirely from pig cells.

Showcasing the fillet at an event in Berlin, which was hosted by MyriaMeat investor SPRIN-D, the German innovation agency, the cultivated meat uses no scaffolds or plant proteins for shape. “Our meat is free from vegetable additives and genetic modifications,” said Malte Tiburcy, co-founder of MyriaMeat and head of research at the University of Göttingen.

“The industrial revolution is coming, We have the technological knowledge to end the suffering of billions of animals while feeding humanity on the basis of a healthier, more sustainable product,” said managing director Florian Hüttner. “We have a responsibility to facilitate that change.”

How MyriaMeat produces cultivated pork with 100% pig cells

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A post shared by MyriaMeat Cultivated Meat (@myriameat_gmbh)

Founded in 2022 by researchers from the University of Göttingen, MyriaMeat transfers its founders’ patented medical technology to food applications. Developed over 25 years of research, it leverages pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) and parthenogenetic stem cells, which allow it to grow functional muscle structures and whole cuts of meat.

Typically, producing structured or thick meats can be aided by growing cells on a scaffold, which enables the attachment, differentiation and maturation of cells in a specific manner. But scaffolding has a high cost attached to it. iPSCs, meanwhile, possess self-assembling properties that can be utilised by organoids to reproduce features of in-vitro tissue organisation and mimic the characteristics of a variety of tissues.

MyriaMeat believes only iPSC-derived pure muscles can recreate animal muscles as closely as possible, and notes that the muscles it has developed can contract.

“Our unique iPSC pipeline allows us to obtain stable stem cell cultures from a single, harmless biopsy,” said Hüttner. “Our vision is to redefine meat consumption in line with the needs of a growing world population and environmental protection, significantly reducing the CO2 emissions of meat production

Fellow cultivated pork producer Meatable, which is gearing up to launch in Singapore this year, also uses a technology based on iPSCs to make its product. The company has streamlined the process in a way that it now only needs four days to create fully differentiated cultivated meat – the fastest in the industry. UK startup 3DBT, meanwhile, has created a cultivated pork fillet without any plant-based scaffolding, fillers or blends either, forgoing the hybrid approach being undertaken by many in the industry (including Meatable).

Companies like Mewery, Clever Carnivore, Uncommon, Ivy Farm Technologies, Joes Future Food Tech, CellX and Magic Valley are all working on cultivated pork too. They’re creating a solution to the intensifying concerns about pig meat – outbreaks of African Swine Fever have occurred in many parts of the world recently, with pig populations being culled in Russia, Hong Kong, the UK, the US and India. That has led to a shortage of pork and subsequently driven up prices, with the viral disease adding to the meat’s existing carcinogenic status.

A tasting event for cultivated meat

Courtesy: MyriaMeat

“In our company, it’s now about implementation, no longer basic research, and we have demonstrated this with our prototype developed in Göttingen within just one year,” said Hüttner.

“At MyriaMeat, we have built a platform not only for the production of high-quality and pure meat but also for a variety of other meat-based products and are an ideal partner for the development of innovative foods with alternative proteins,” he added.

The company has already secured €43M in funding, which was the largest investment in a cultivated meat startup in Europe last year. Aside from pork, it has plans to create cultivated Wagyu beef and deer meat, and it’s in discussions with industrial partners and potential investors to facilitate its scale-up efforts and host a tasting event later this year.

Last month, Meatable held the EU’s first public tasting of cultivated meat, showcasing its hybrid pork sausages to members of the media, government and industry.

While MyriaMeat scales up, it will likely keep a close eye on consumer preferences and regulatory developments in its home country, where pork consumption fell by 19% from 2015 to 2022. A YouGov survey of 2,000 Germans published in March showed that 47% of Germans are willing to try cultivated meat – although two-thirds of consumers find plant-based meat more appealing.

According to the poll, two-thirds of Germans also believe cultivated meat should be produced locally to benefit the economy if it were to come to market, and 47% think the government should advance the sector’s development and support farmers to capitalise on the opportunities presented by alternative proteins.

For its part, the German government has committed €38M in its 2024 federal budget to promote alternative proteins, including the manufacturing and processing of cultivated meat.

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This post was originally published on Green Queen.
May 6, 2024

Meatly’s Protein-Free Culture Medium Dramatically Cuts the Production Cost of Cultivated Meat

4 Mins Read
British cultivated meat company Meatly has created a first-of-its-kind protein-free culture medium that can significantly reduce the cost of manufacturing these proteins.

Ahead of its impending regulatory approval in the UK, Meatly has announced the development of a culture medium that can bring down the cost of producing cultivated meat, solving one of the industry’s major bottlenecks.

Culture media are essential to the production of cultivated meat, entailing a mix of nutrients to facilitate the growth of animal cells. According to Meatly, this accounts for the majority of the costs involved in the entire process, reducing which is key to reaching price parity with conventional meat.

Typically, culture media cost hundreds of pounds per litre, but Meatly’s protein-free version brings that down to just £1 ($1.25) – a fraction of what companies currently pay. Co-founder and chief scientific officer Helder Cruz called it a “huge step forward” in scaling the startup’s technology and commercialising its products at an affordable price.

Our protein-free culture medium represents a critical milestone for us and the wider cultivated meat industry,” he said. “By setting this new benchmark, we are driving the cost of production down significantly, which is something the industry has been grappling with for years.”

Slashing the most significant costs by 100-fold

Courtesy: Meatly/Omni

The new cell culture medium created by Meatly contains no serum or animal-derived components, steroids, hormones, antibiotics or growth factors – the latter is responsible for the bulk of the costs associated with culture media. The startup’s innovation is food-safe and used in its suspension culture bioreactors without microcarriers, which are typically needed to help cells proliferate and enhance their density.

The fact that there are no microcarriers, growth factors or expensive proteins means industrial-scale production could be economically viable, and purchasing higher volumes of the culture medium would only bring down prices further.

The cost of producing cultivated meat is one of the industry’s most pressing challenges. But researchers have pinpointed cell culture media design as the most significant hurdle facing the commercialisation of these proteins, given that optimising media for a specific culture system requires tons of effort and investment.

One estimate has suggested that cultivated meat needs to reach production costs of $2.92 per lb to be on par with conventional meat. And while companies have managed to reduce costs by 99% in less than a decade, McKinsey forecasts that it will still take until 2030 for it to reach price parity.

Meatly’s breakthrough could speed that projection up considerably. “Meatly has single-handedly slashed those costs a hundredfold or more,” said Jim Mellon, founder of Agronomics, an investor in the startup. He noted that the development establishes the company as a “true technological leader” in the field. “This is a huge step forward in bringing the cost of cultivated meat to price parity with conventional meat and, ultimately, toward the mass adoption of cultivated products.”

Meatly gears up for UK cultivated meat debut

Courtesy: Harriet Constable/Meatly

The development of the cell culture media comes two months after Meatly completed the first production run of its canned chicken pâté for pets, which combined cultivated chicken with pulses and vegetables from British vegan dog food company Omni.

Previously called Good Dog Food, the London-based startup rebranded in late 2023 ahead of a planned market launch this year, which would make it the first company to commercialise cultivated meat in Europe. Meatly indicated in February that it was expecting regulatory approval from the UK Food Standards Agency (FSA) within “the next three months”.

“The company expects to shortly receive regulatory approval, and I am excited to feed their delicious products to my dogs,” said Mellon. The FSA has kickstarted a process to accelerate the market entry of novel foods in the UK, after finally breaking away from the pre-Brexit laws it inherited from the EU.

It would be a major milestone in the cultivated meat sector, built upon a relatively minor level of investment – Meatly has raised £3.6M since being founded in 2022, much lower than many of its counterparts across the world. According to the startup, that proves “there is a fast and cost-effective way to scale cultivated meat”. The 150g Omni Feast: Chicken Revolution cans will cost about £1 each.

Meatly has secured “key partnerships with manufacturers”, including with petcare retailer (and seed investor) Pets at Home, ahead of its market entry. “We need cultivated meat now more than ever. Pet food is the natural starting point, given consumers’ excitement,” Meatly co-founder and CEO Owen Ensor previously said. “We’re thrilled to be at the heart of the future of meat production in the UK.”

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May 6, 2024

Aleph Farms Taps Into AI for More Efficient Cultivated Beef Production

6 Mins Read
Israeli cultivated meat leader Aleph Farms has partnered with biotech startup BioRaptor to integrate AI into its production process, which will enable scalability and reduce costs.

Ahead of launching into restaurants in its home country, Aleph Farms is tapping into BioRaptor’s artificial-intelligence-led operating system to optimise the production of its cultivated beef.

By partnering with BioRaptor, an expert in streamlining biotech processes through data and AI, Aleph Farms hopes to derisk its scale-up plans as it transitions to large-scale facilities with significant capital expenditure. The AI will complement human intelligence by collecting and extrapolating both large datasets generated throughout the cultivated meat development process.

“There are massive amounts of data created during the development of state-of-the-art production bioprocesses, which, when extracted, interpreted, and collected into actionable insights, can boost productivity and reduce costs, time, and human error,” said BioRaptor co-founder and CEO Ori Zakin. “This is exactly our plan with Aleph Farms.”

Using AI to make cultivated meat cheaper and faster

Courtesy: Amit Goren/Aleph Farms

Cultivated meat is grown in bioreactors that provide controlled, clean, and closed environments where animal cells can thrive. These cultivators continuously feed the cells with nutrients and are monitored for various process parameters such as pH, dissolved oxygen and temperature. Understanding this relationship between the cell feed and its environment is vital for defining the most optimal growth conditions.

BioRaptor’s solution allows Aleph Farms to smoothly evaluate cross-experimental findings to and have the results configured on a single platform. The ability to review both historical and real-time data, and make projections that enhance experiments leads to a more efficient and less cost-intensive scale-up process.

At Aleph Farms’ current facility in Rehovot, Israel, it can initially produce 10 tonnes of cultivated steak annually. It also announced the acquisition of another plant in Modi’in, Israel last year, alongside an agreement with ESCO Aster in Singapore (the world’s only approved industrial manufacturer for cultured meat). And in February, it partnered with biomanufacturer BBGI and synbio research and manufacturing company Fermbox Bio to set up a production plant in Thailand.

Scalability and costs are two of the most pressing challenges of the cultivated meat industry. Aleph Farms, which aims to reach $1B in revenue by 2030, has previously received 66 million NIS ($18M) in government funding to precisely address these bottlenecks.

Cultured meat itself needs to reach production costs of $2.92 per pound to be price-competitive with conventional meat. But while companies have managed to cut manufacturing costs by 99% in less than a decade, McKinsey analysis suggests it will still take until 2030 for these proteins to become as cheap as meat. “Of common animal proteins, beef delivers the highest value in global markets, so by focusing on cultivated beef, we are able to shorten the timeline to price parity,” Yoav Reisler, senior marketing and communications manager at Aleph Farms, told Green Queen in January.

“By simplifying bioprocess data management and suggesting optimal experimental design, we can enable smoother technological developments for the processes that the cellular agriculture industry has been pioneering,” added Zakin.

Alternative protein’s AI footprint expands

Courtesy: Daniel Elkayam/Aleph Farms

With the large amount of data generated by Aleph Farms, the BioRaptor team-up could help accelerate the development of robust and scalable production processes, according to Sagit Shalel-Levanon, senior director of process development at the cultivated meat startup.

“Our team’s scientific expertise in design of experiment (DoE) methodology and statistical analysis, complemented by BioRaptor’s AI-driven solution, will allow us to better understand the interactions between various process inputs and conditions,” she said.

“Deploying BioRaptor’s most advanced AI and machine learning solution into our R&D will provide additional support for our team to optimise processes for cost and scalability, laying a solid groundwork for our mid- to large-scale production,” said co-founder and CTO Neta Lavon. “Our approach is to build the right foundations as we grow and avoid massive capital expenditure before our process is fully ready for scale.

She continued: “We are investing time and resources to implement the most advanced tools into our differentiated technology platform and its various applications in food and beyond, thereby realising the full potential of cellular agriculture in the burgeoning bioeconomy.”

An increasing number of alternative protein startups are deploying AI to streamline ingredient discovery, research, and production processes. Players like Chile’s NotCo, California’s Climax Foods and Singapore’s Howw Foods are all harnessing the tech for product development, while US mycelium meat maker Meati has used it to conduct a study about its product’s health benefits. And earlier this week, Shiru launched a protein discovery platform and marketplace powered by the tech.

But AI also comes with its own climate conundrums, as these systems are run on large, 24/7 data centres that mostly use fossil fuel energy, accounting for 2.5-3.7% of global GHG emissions. They use a massive amount of water too, with US centres having consumed 1.7 billion litres per day in 2014 – 0.14% of the nation’s daily water use.

“On an ongoing basis, we carefully manage our environmental footprint and this includes conducting a life-cycle assessment on our cultivated meat products, alongside measuring our corporate ecological footprint (greenhouse gases, electricity, water, and waste),” Reisler told Green Queen. “In addition, we have launched programs for energy and resource efficiency. Our transition to renewable energies, our waste management program and our detailed roadmap to net zero help us navigate through a variety of challenges as we scale and eventually meet our ambitious environmental goals.”

Aleph Farms to roll out cultivated steak in foodservice

Courtesy: Aleph Farms

Aleph Farms hopes to use BioRaptor’s AI to build the right foundations and avoid tall capital expenditures before its process is fully ready to scale. In January, it became the third cultivated meat producer in the world to receive regulatory approval, with Israel’s health ministry clearing it to sell Black Angus Petit Steak under its Aleph Cuts brand.

“We are determined to build up our capabilities in production and sales support before initiating a full product launch. This will help ensure a steady supply of Aleph Cuts to consumers and continuous revenue for Aleph Farms,” said Reisler.”

“Following the completion of a Good Manufacturing Practices (GMP) inspection of our pilot production facility in Rehovot, we will introduce Aleph Cuts in limited quantities via tailored tasting experiences for consumers and other relevant stakeholders,” said Reisler. “This targeted market activation allows us to gather direct feedback from consumers and refine our brand positioning in collaboration with them, helping lay the foundation for a successful full launch.”

He continued: “As Aleph Cuts becomes a new and differentiated category in the animal protein space, applying these marketing learnings is vital before becoming a staple on restaurant menus, in foodservice, and, eventually, in retail.”

The company, which has raised a total of $118M in funding, is also awaiting approval from food safety regulators in Singapore, Switzerland, the UK and the US. The latter made headlines this week after Florida banned the production and sale of cultivated meat in the state. “Barriers to process in specific countries and states may force producers of cultivated meat to redirect resources elsewhere, including to China. Can they afford to relinquish their global leadership due to shortsighted political interests during an election year?” noted Reisler.

“Limiting consumer freedom and restricting entrepreneurial freedom contradict the fundamental principle of a free democratic society. Shouldn’t consumers be given the freedom to make informed choices on their food?” he added.

“Banning a product that’s not yet on the shelves doesn’t improve ranchers’ condition. Fear of change often stems from a lack of trust in the system and concerns about the future. We are ready for an open exchange on how to implement a transition to sustainable and secure food systems, one that is just and inclusive for all stakeholders, including and especially for livestock farmers.”

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May 2, 2024

Mewery Establishes Stable Cell Line to Scale Up Cultivated Pork Production Ahead of Pilot Plant Opening

5 Mins Read
Czech startup Mewery has achieved a breakthrough in its tech to produce cultivated meat, establishing a stable cell line to enable scalability.

Mewery has formed a stable cell line in the development process for its cultivated pork, a key step that will help enable large-scale production of its meat.

The Brno-based startup’s scientists conducted a number of cell isolations to identify which ones exhibit the most favourable response to its co-cultivation technology, which involves pig and microalgae cells in a serum-free medium.

“This achievement represents another important step forward in our ongoing efforts to bring cultivated meat to consumers,” said chief science officer Vladislav Strmiska. “The establishment of a stable cell line lays the groundwork for consistent, high-quality meat production without relying on animal agriculture.”

The milestone will help Mewery move from lab volumes of dozens of litres, and potentially hundreds of litres volume in its pilot facility, which is set to be operational in the coming months. “We are also just in the pre-negotiation phase with potential commercial scale-up partners in Europe and the US,” Rostislav Brzobohatý, Mewery’s chief commercial officer, told Green Queen.

The company is in talks with a partner in Switzerland for the successful completion of its proprietary co-cultivation process in large 200-litre bioreactors and the launch of its demo operations, which are its immediate priorities.

How stable cell lines benefit cultivated meat production

Courtesy: Mewery

A stable cell line refers to a cell population that can continually grow and retain the desired properties over many generations. It’s the foundational building block of cultivated meat, but a lack of availability of the right cell lines has been a major bottleneck for commercialisation in the industry.

Achieving stable cell lines represents a few major advantages for producers. First, it enables them to deliver consistent quality and taste. Stable cells allow precise control and characterisation, ensuring that each batch delivers a piece of cultivated meat identical to the one before.

Secondly, it reduces the reliance on livestock farming, eliminating the need for animals in the production process. A 2023 industry survey by think tank the Good Food Institute revealed that 74% of companies have achieved identical or better results after establishing a cell line in serum-free conditions.

And finally, it paves the way for large-scale production of cultivated meat, helping companies accelerate their path to commercialisation.

Apart from the stable cell lines, Mewery has also expanded its cell bank to include multiple types of non-genetically-modified porcine cells. This will help it optimise the growth conditions of these cells for faster and more efficient production, and create a broader range of cultivated meat products, such as different cuts of meat.

“We are committed to developing delicious, sustainable, and accessible cultivated meat for everyone,” said Mewery CEO Roman Lauš. “This breakthrough brings us a significant step closer to achieving that goal.”

Courtesy: Mewery

In January, Mewery was awarded €200,000 in grants from the Czech government to further improve its platform’s efficiency. The funding was set to be used to characterize basic parts of the production process and expand research efforts into cell growth and interactions. “This knowledge will be essential for designing a near-future scalable production process that is efficient, cost-effective, and meets the highest quality standards,” Lauš explained at the time.

But while the startup did receive backing from the Czech government, the country’s lawmakers were also in support of an EU bill that sought to restrict the cultivated meat sector earlier this year. “We have also learned that our government’s view on the EU Agrifish Bill is just to start a broader discussion,” Brzobohatý revealed, adding that Mewery has had a “very positive experience” while in close contact with the agriculture ministry. “We are actively discussing the creation of a legislative framework to allow controlled tastings inspired by the Dutch model.”

It was only last month that Dutch cultured pork producer Meatable held the EU’s first public tasting of cultivated meat, after its government established a framework for such events. It followed US producer Fork & Good’s pub dinner in Switzerland and Australian startup Vow’s event in Iceland (it has since obtained Singaporean approval for its cultivated quail).

“As regards the proposals to restrict cultivated meat, our view is clear,” said Brzobohatý. “We believe that the choice of the food they consume is up to the consumers alone. If such food is approved by the authorities whose jurisdiction and competence this falls under, all parties should accept this. The role of politicians is to set the framework and possibly moderate the debate, but they should certainly not seek to substitute for food safety authorities.”

Mewery also indicated that part of the government investment will be used for data gathering ahead of filing for regulatory approval. While its first choice would be to apply in the US, if the regulatory framework in the EU is cleared up by this time, it will likely do so there too. “Another country we are considering is Switzerland, which meets our requirements for our pre-commercial pilot operation,” said Brzobohatý.

Disrupting an industry in disarray

Courtesy: Mewery

Founded in 2020 by Lauš, Mewery has previously teased products like meatballs and tenderloin made from 75% porcine cells and 25% microalgae cells – by developing pork on microalgae scaffolding, the startup has slashed production costs by 70%. Last year, it debuted a burger at a small tasting in its home country, where over 90% of attendees indicated their willingness to taste the cultivated product.

When asked whether its products would be hybrid (a mix of cultivated animal cells and plants), Brzobohatý said: “We are continuously exploring all the possibilities. Our product is inherently hybrid by virtue of our co-cultivation method of combining pork cells with microalgae cells. At the same time, we are considering a pork burger as our first product, which would be a natural fit if combined with plant-based mass.”

Concerns about pig meat have continued to boil over African Swine Fever outbreaks in many parts of the world recently, with pig populations being culled in Russia, Hong Kong, the UK, the US and India. This has led to a shortage of pork and subsequently driven up prices, with the viral disease adding to the meat’s already carcinogenic status.

It’s why novel options like Mewery’s are crucial for a stable and sustainable food system. Clever Carnivore, Uncommon, Ivy Farm Technologies, Joes Future Food Tech, CellX, Magic Valley, MyriaMeat, and Meatable are all working on cultivated pork too.

The post Mewery Establishes Stable Cell Line to Scale Up Cultivated Pork Production Ahead of Pilot Plant Opening appeared first on Green Queen.

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May 2, 2024

Florida Officially Bans Cultivated Meat as Governor Mocks World Economic Forum

9 Mins Read
Florida governor Ron DeSantis has signed a bill to ban the sale and production of cultivated meat in the state, in a news conference that poked fun at the World Economic Forum. The alternative protein industry says it’s “reckless” and sends a “terrible message”.

All it took was 24 hours. Ron DeSantis couldn’t wait to sign the much-debated SB 1084, a bill that was headlined by a ban on cultivated meat in Florida.

“Some people think Florida is theme parks, South Beach and maybe some oranges, but they don’t understand that we have one of the top cattle industries in the country,” the governor said in a press conference surrounded by cattle ranchers in Hardee County. “What we’re protecting here is the industry against acts of man, against an ideological agenda that wants to finger agriculture as the problem, that views things like raising cattle as destroying our climate.”

DeSantis was stood behind a banner that read ‘Save Our Beef’ in the style of the World Economic Forum’s logo. The organisation has previously outlined the importance of alternative proteins to meet the needs of a population that will reach 10 billion in 2050 and combat the changing climate. “I’m sure they’ll say: ‘Hey, wait a minute, just hear us out before you say yuck,’” said DeSantis. “I say Florida has heard enough on that.”

Taking aim at the “liberal elite”, he added: “Take your fake lab-grown meat elsewhere. We’re not doing that in the state of Florida.”

The bill makes it a second-degree misdemeanour to manufacture, transport, commercialise or sell cultivated meat. Businesses can have their licences revoked and receive an immediate stop-sale order. All in a state where meat production continues to rise, with half of its land set aside for cattle farming.

Courtesy: Eat JUST
“This legislation has always been about one thing – helping one industry, Big Ag, avoid accountability and competition. Today, these multinational corporations and their lobbyists won,” said Tom Rossmeissl, head of global marketing at Eat JUST, one of two companies that have sold cultivated meat (under its GOOD Meat brand) in the US after clearing extensive food safety assessments by the USDA and FDA.

Pointing to these regulatory approvals, Pepin Tuma, legislative director at alternative protein think tank the Good Food Institute (GFI), said: “Why are politicians with no experience in food safety interfering where they don’t belong?” In doing so, he argued that these lawmakers are “foreclosing innovative investments that would actually create opportunities for Florida farmers”.

It’s a “reckless” move that “ignores food safety experts and science, stifles consumer choice, and hinders American innovation”, according to Sean Edgett, chief legal officer at UPSIDE Foods, the other company approved to sell cultivated meat in the US.

Why Florida decided to ban cultivated meat

SB 1084 was introduced by Republican state representative Jay Collins in the Senate at the end of last year. “There are many concerns right here and, until we have those studies and there’s proof positive that this process is going to work, we want to ban this in the state of Florida because it’s just not there quite yet,” said Collins.

The bill has gradually moved through both chambers of the Florida government, with the Senate voting 29-10 in favour in late February, followed by an 86-27 vote in the house a week later. It reached DeSantis on Tuesday, who could either sign or veto the bill within 15 days, though he was widely expected to do the former.

“Today, Florida is fighting back against the global elite’s plan to force the world to eat meat grown in a petri dish or bugs to achieve their authoritarian goals,” he said, painting a misrepresentation picture of how cultivated meat is produced. At a scale large enough to sell to consumers, these proteins are grown in bioreactors, not petri dishes. “Our administration will continue to focus on investing in our local farmers and ranchers, and we will save our beef,” added DeSantis.

Courtesy: UPSIDE Foods/Canva AI

Florida’s agricultural commissioner, Wilton Simpson, called cultivated meat a “disgraceful attempt” that undermined “authentic agriculture”. “Who wants to have a biomass shipped to their house, put into a tank, grown in a lab, and then put it through a 3D printer to make it look like a steak you want to eat?” he said at the conference, seemingly bundling three different processes of making alternative proteins into one.

As GFI’s Pepin underlined, politicians have a lack of expertise on these subjects. But they’re playing food police instead of choosing innovation, economic growth and consumer choice. This is echoed by Edgett. “This is a protectionist policy for entrenched interests, violates free market principles, and limits consumer choice,” he said, adding that Florida was “choosing winners and losers when they should let consumers make their own decisions about what to eat”.

Pepin agreed that Floridians should not be limited by government overreach: “The Sunshine State’s eccentric decision casts a long shadow on its laudable ambition to keep the state open for business.”

Cultivated meat ban closes off investors and jobs

Like the larger food tech and venture capital space, cultivated meat has already been suffering from a dip in investments globally. According to GFI, funding in this category dropped by 75% in 2023. And so far, the first quarter of this year has seen merely 5% of the $226M invested in the sector in the previous 12 months. It’s why VC firm AgFunder has earmarked cultivated meat as a “category to watch” this year.

Florida’s ban has raised concerns over how investors will see this industry. “This bill sends a terrible message to the investors, scientists, and entrepreneurs that have built America’s global leadership in alternative proteins,” said Eat JUST’s Rossmeissl, noting that the law is a setback to consumer choice, as well as “Florida’s technology sector, innovators and entrepreneurs, and all those working to stop the worst impacts of climate change”.

Meat production alone accounts for 60% of the food system’s total emissions globally, which itself make up a third of all human-caused emissions. Peer-reviewed studies have shown that cultivated meat is drastically better for the environment, with a life-cycle assessment (LCA) from 2023 revealing that cultivated meat is three times more adept at turning crops into meat than even the “most efficient” livestock. A similar LCA by GFI in 2021 suggested that cultivated meat produced via renewable energy can have a 92% lower impact on global heating, needs 95% less land, and uses 78% less water compared to conventionally farmed beef.

“A ban like this threatens a free market and sets a dangerous precedent for government interference,” Emily Bogan, head of business opportunities at cultivated meat company Fork & Good, told a House panel in February. “We want to ensure that affordable meat is available for generations to come.”

Courtesy: WildType

For all of DeSantis’s rhetoric about protecting American farmers and saving American jobs, industry members say this will have the opposite effect. Rossmeissl believes China will be celebrating, “as they are closer to overcoming our nation’s lead in this emerging sector”. This chimes with the comments of Justin Kolbeck, co-founder of cultivated seafood company Wildtype, who told the House panel that the ban “will deepen our country’s dependence on imports from countries like China” and “create Chinese jobs at the expense of small businesses like mine”.

And far from taking jobs, analysis from the ClimateWorks Foundation and the Global Methane Hub has found that the continued openings of cultivated meat facilities around the world could support up to 83 million jobs by 2050.

“Some of America’s largest meat companies have been early investors in cultivated meat,” said UPSIDE Foods’ Edgett. “They recognise cultivated meat’s potential to complement conventional meat production, improve supply chain resilience, and ensure American’s access to meat as global demand for animal protein is projected to double by 2050. Florida’s ban is an affront to progress and job creation. Florida should embrace scientific and technological innovation.”

Despite fears of a domino effect, startups remain positive

Courtesy: Upside Foods

Before passing the ban, Florida’s lawmakers did make one amendment. They removed a stipulation that would have prohibited research on cultivated meat from being carried out in the state, out of concerns that this could affect the space industry, which is looking at cultivated meat for long-term journeys.

However, it’s the first state to officially prohibit the sale of cultivated meat in the US, and after Italy, only the second government globally to do so. It’s far from the only American state to have attempted this in the first place, though: Alabama, Arizona, Wisconsin, Texas, Nebraska, Tennessee and Florida have all proposed various types of bans on cultivated meat. In fact, just last week, the Alabama House passed a bill similar to Florida’s, and its counterpart in Arizona did so for a restriction on product labelling (no cultivated meat has made it to retail so far, anywhere in the world).

Florida itself has had two other attempts. Tyler Sirois’s HB 435 died before it reached the Senate, but Danny Alvarez’s HB 1071 is being contemplated in the House. The fear is that the passing of SB 1084 could create a ripple effect across America, where other states could use it almost as a precedent to introduce their own bans. DeSantis himself said so at the press conference, noting: “There have been other countries… that have said no, I think there’s going to be more states that are increasingly going to say no.”

But you only need to look at the response from the North American Meat Institute, the country’s oldest and largest trade association (representing 95% of the US’s meat output), to gauge that this is not a good idea. In a letter sent to DeSantis in March, the group called the ban “bad public policy”. “These bills establish a precedent for adopting policies and regulatory requirements that could one day adversely affect the bills’ supporters,” it said, emphasising the importance of consumer choice.

“Cultivated meat has been deemed safe to eat by experts from the USDA and FDA, so this is not a move to protect Florida’s consumers,” said Edgett. “We’re ready to build a better food future together.”

Like UPSIDE Foods, other cultivated meat companies remain positive. Rossmeissl said that while Eat JUST was disappointed about the ban, it would not stop the development of cultivated meat. This was echoed by Wildtype’s marketing VP, Jenny Berien, and fellow cultivated seafood company BlueNalu’s associate director of corporate communications, Mia Montanile.

Courtesy: BlueNalu

They are co-chairs of US cellular agriculture alliance the Association of Meat, Poultry and Seafood (AMPS) Innovation. In a joint statement, they noted that despite the ban, there “continues to be widespread recognition” of cultivated meat’s benefits, including protein supply consistency and enhanced food security. “Recognising the need to diversify our protein sources in the face of growing demand and finite resources, many nations around the world and leaders in the incumbent agricultural industry are supporters and even investors in the cultivated meat and seafood industry,” they noted.

“Bringing new, innovative sources of protein production to the table is critical to bridge the gap between global supply and demand,” they continued. “With its deep roots in agricultural innovation, the United States is well-positioned to lead this next chapter in sustainable protein production – a chapter powered by a diverse community that includes regenerative farmers, ranchers and fishers, as well as innovators in animal cell cultivation. To feed a growing world using fewer resources, we’ll need more agricultural innovation, not less.”

The post Florida Officially Bans Cultivated Meat as Governor Mocks World Economic Forum appeared first on Green Queen.

This post was originally published on Green Queen.
May 1, 2024

South Korea Inaugurates Regulation-Free Special Zone for Cultivated Meat Development

5 Mins Read
The South Korean government has created a special zone designed for the development of cultivated foods, which will exempt companies from certain regulatory hurdles to help them commercialise their products.

South Korea has taken a massive stride towards the commercialisation of cultivated meat, designating the eastern province of Gyeongsangbuk-do a regulation-exempt zone for companies innovating in this space.

Formally titled the Gyeongbuk Cell-Cultivated Foods Regulatory-Free Special Zone (RFSZ), the area will harbour 10 cultivated meat companies and has received a special exemption for using biopsies and same-day slaughtered tissues in support of mass production of high-quality cultivated meat.

One of these startups will be TissenBioFarm, which last year debuted a 10kg piece of cultivated meat to commemorate the opening of the nation’s Cellular Agriculture Support Center. Its CEO Wonil Han said the RSFZ will be a “major turning point” not just for his company, but the local economy and the cultivated food industry too.

South Korea helping startups commercialise cultivated meat

Courtesy: TissenBioFarm

RSFZs were introduced in 2019 by the Ministry of SMEs and Startups to facilitate the creation of a flexible business landscape outside Seoul, allowing companies to carry out tests for innovative technologies and conduct business without regulations. Startups were also backed by funding for R&D and tax breaks.

Initially, the government identified seven such zones, focusing on areas including digital healthcare, e-mobility, battery recycling and smart wellness. But this is the first RSFZ to address food, and choosing to focus on cultivated meat highlights the government’s growing acceptance of the industry, which it has previously selected in its top 10 lists of food and drug regulatory innovations and core food tech areas.

The cultivated meat FRSZ was inaugurated by the governors of Gyeongsangbuk-do and the Uiseong-gun county, who believe the supply of fresh cells is key to commercialising high-quality cultivated meat The exemption is further expected to help startups improve the flavour and texture of cultivated meat and enhance cell growth.

The zone will be operational for the next five years, starting next month and running until December 2028, and has been allocated ₩19.9B ($14.4M). This is just one of Gyeongsangbuk-do and Uiseong-gun’s efforts to build a more welcoming environment for cultivated meat. They recently completed work on a local industry support centre in the Bio Valley General Industrial Complex, and are constructing a Good Manufacturing Practice facility for startups in this space, which is set to be completed this year.

Apart from TissenBioFarm, it will be host to LARTBIO, DaNAgreen, Seawith, Micro Digital, Mynu, LMK, SSBIO PHARM, K-Bio CMO Center and Gyeongbuk TP. These startups will work to demonstrate the commercialisation of cultivated foods in the Bio Valley complex in Uiseong-gun. TissenBioFarm, for example, will develop and demonstrate marketable cultivated foods using its 3D biofabrication method for mass production and food additives for the taste and texture of the meat.

“With this designation, we will strengthen our competitiveness in the global market and grow with local partners. We look forward to seeing Gyeongsangbuk-do becoming a global hub in cell-cultivated food technology,” said Han.

Taste and price parity key amid regulatory progress

Courtesy: TissenBioFarm

The move comes just months after the country’s Ministry of Food and Drug Safety established a framework for the regulatory approval of cultivated meat, inviting producers to submit their products for approval. It came a year after 28 industry stakeholders signed an MoU to advance the country’s cultivated meat industry, and the North Gyeongsang province saw the opening of the aforementioned cellular agriculture support centre.

Dossiers submitted by companies need to include safety verification data, including the name of the raw material, the origin of the cell, the manufacturing process, and the usage history. If the cells are derived from livestock, applicants must provide information about the donor, such as country of origin, gender, age, and slaughter inspection certificate. The entire process is set to take up to 270 working days, meaning even if companies apply soon, it’s unlikely that any clearance will be given this year.

The approval process will cost companies a fairly steep ₩45M ($34,000), in contrast with the no-fee assessments offered by countries like Singapore and Israel. Plenty of nations do charge a fee, though, which is either mandatory or voluntary (to speed up the process) – this includes Australia and New Zealand, the US, the UK, and the EU.

But despite the revision of the regulatory framework in January – which concluded a process that began in 2022 – barriers remain for full-scale commercialisation of cultivated meat in South Korea. This includes securing economic efficiency by establishing mass production systems, and achieving flavour and price parity with conventional meat.

In October, a 1,110-person survey suggested that 90% of South Koreans were willing to try cultivated meat at least once, with 19% saying they would prefer it over plant proteins – but price and taste/texture are major purchase drivers, important 65% and 62% of respondents, respectively. While two-thirds of citizens spend up to ₩50,000 ($23-38) per week on meat products for the whole household, only 12% would pay ₩1,000-3,000 (75 cents to $2) more per 100g of cultivated meat.

However, 57% and 25% said they’d eat cultivated pork and beef, respectively, if they’re cheaper than their farmed counterparts. It showed that scaling up production to reach price parity is one of the sector’s tallest obstacles in the country, but by modernising its regulations and designating a regulation-free zone to foster innovation, it looks like South Korea is turning over a new leaf with cultivated meat.

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May 1, 2024

Future Food Quick Bites: Cultivated Quail, MasterChef Pros & A Cheese Debacle

5 Mins Read
In our weekly column, we round up the latest news and developments in the alternative protein and sustainable food industry. This week, Future Food Quick Bites covers Vow’s Tippling Club collab, US bans on cultivated meat, and a climate change podcast.

New products and launches

Australian cultivated meat startup Vow, which recently became the fourth company to receive regulatory approval, has announced its first restaurant partner, Singapore’s Tippling Club, which will serve its Forged Parfait with cultured quail from May 3-14. The product debuted at Mandala Club earlier this month.

In the UK, Alpro has rolled out four new protein-centric SKUs: two original- and chocolate-flavoured Plant Protein drinks, and yoghurts in mixed berries and mango-banana variants. It has also introduced 500ml versions of its unsweetened almond and oat milks.

UK tofu maker The Tofoo Co has partnered with vegan restaurant Temple of Seitan to launch seitan in original and pepperoni flavours at UK retailers, which will be available at Waitrose and Tesco (only the original) from today.

Automotive giant Mercedes-Benz is working to align its German canteens with the Planetary Health Diet, and has pledged to serve predominantly plant-based food by the end of 2025. Last week, it linked up with Stuttgart restaurant Vhy! to showcase the potential of vegan food.

In the US, online grocery retailer FreshDirect has unveiled Foraged Mushroom Meat, which are available in nuggets and pulled formats and made from the stalks of mushrooms, alongside soy protein, tapioca flour and coconut oil.

Spanish seafood producer Angulas Aguinaga is entering the alternative seafood world via a collaboration with Catalan startup Vrave, starting with a konjac-based calamari to be sold under the former’s Aguinamar brand. They plan to roll out the calamari in the UK, France and Portugal next month.

Courtesy: Heura/LinkedIn

Meanwhile, fellow Catalan vegan brand Heura‘s three-week veggie sandwich pilot at French bakery chain Boulangerie Ange last November has been made permanent, with the sandwich now vegan thanks to the use of Violife cheese.

Else Nutrition‘s soy-free vegan infant formula and toddler drink has made its way into the Asia-Pacific market, launching in Australia and New Zealand.

And BBC Springwatch host Gillian Burke has launched a new climate podcast called If I Ruled The World, where she interviews scientists, lawmakers, artists, journalists, activists and entrepreneurs about system change and their solution to the climate crisis.

Finance and policy developments

Berlin-based startup Cultimate Foods has raised €2.3M in a seed funding round to scale up production and expand commercial operations for its plant-based fat ingredient for meat analogues.

Likewise, France’s Edonia has bagged €2M in investment to produce plant-based meat analogues from microalgae like spirulina and chlorella.

UK venture capital firm CPT Capital has teamed up with Accenture, the Good Food Institute Europe and the Alternative Proteins Association to launch the third edition of its Coller Startup Competition for alternative protein companies, with the winner receiving £100,000.

Courtesy: Milky Plant

Also in the UK, Milky Plant has turned over £2M in two years with its homemade alt-milk machine, with sales set to reach £10M by the end of the year.

In Alabama, the House of Representatives has voted in favour of a bill to ban the production and sale of cultivated meat by an 85-14 vote, which will now return to the Senate before being passed. The House amended the bill to say it would not prevent people from researching these proteins in the state.

Similarly, the Arizona House has voted for a bill requiring cultivated meat products to be labelled clearly to distinguish themselves from conventional meat, though this is a watered-down version of the original proposal, which sought to ban the use of meat-related terms on packaging labels for these products. The bill still needs Senate approval.

Partnerships, research and breakthroughs

Australian cultivated pork producer Magic Valley hosted a tasting event for its bao buns at John Gorilla Café in Brunswick, which received rave reviews from attendees.

Courtesy: Magic Valley

Vegan certification body V-Label has collaborated with the Middle East Vegan Society to accelerate and advance the clear and transparent labelling of vegan and vegetarian products in the region.

In the US, animal nutrition company Wilbur-Ellius Nutrition and precision fermentation protein startup Bond Pet Foods have teamed up to develop ingredients for the pet food industry.

Californian startup Checkerspot has received a patent for its non-genetically-engineered high-oleic algae oil ingredient, two weeks after partnering with sustainable nutrition company Mara Renewables to develop omega-3 alternatives to fish oil.

Courtesy: Upfield

Violife Professional, the foodservice arm of plant-based dairy leader Upfield, has partnered with MasterChef: The Professionals winner Alex Webb to showcase foodservice kitchens how to best swap dairy for vegan analogues, curating six dishes using Flora butter and cream and Violife cream cheese.

Plant-based consumption is seemingly on the rise in Romania, up from 30% in 2022 to 39% in 2023, with taste the biggest driver, according to research by Danone Romania.

Courtesy: Climax Foods

Finally, vegan cheesemaker Climax Foods, which was set to become the first plant-based brand to win the Good Food Awards for its blue cheese, was disqualified on the eve of the ceremony, with its founder ascribing it to a pushback from the dairy industry and a retrospective change of rules.

Check out last week’s Future Food Quick Bites.

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April 23, 2024

Internal Rifts and Layoffs Headline Tough Year for Omeat – But Cultivated Meat Startup Will Soon Close New Funding Round

6 Mins Read
Los Angeles startup Omeat has seen its employee count shrink by about 80%, with a change in leadership brought on by what insiders describe as a hostile work culture, according to AgFunderNews.

It was in June last year that Omeat emerged with a serum-free cell culture media solution for cultivated meat production, but a lot has happened since then, with founder Ali Khademhosseini stepping down from his role of CEO, a majority of its workforce being let go, and a raft of challenges leaving the business reeling.

A former staffer told AgFunderNews that the Los Angeles-based startup now has a skeleton staff of about 10 people – mostly the core science team – which is down from a peak of nearly 50. Khademhosseini, meanwhile, was replaced by CTO Jim Miller in November, following multiple complaints by employees accusing him of creating a toxic working culture.

Omeat was founded in 2021 but came out of stealth last year, unveiling an alternative to fetal bovine serum (FBS) created using regenerative plasma drawn humanely from cows that graze freely on its carbon-negative farm. Collected weekly, the process to extract the plasma is similar to human plasma donation – unlike blood, plasma regenerates quickly, so the cows don’t feel depleted.

But while the company has said that Plenty, its cell culture media supplement, is affordable and scalable, its former employees say that it has had trouble expanding its production process – which eventually led to Khademhosseini launching a tirade that resulted in his removal as CEO.

Scaling the scalability challenge

Courtesy: Omeat

Scalability is one of cultivated meat’s major bottlenecks, alongside cost. But while Omeat has obtained 2,000-litre and 10,000-litre bioreactors for its new pilot plant in Thousand Oaks California, it’s still in the process of validating its production process at a 200-litre scale, according to an ex-employee. So far, very few cultivated meat companies have successfully validated their bioreactor technology at a scale of or over 200 litres – these include Good Meat, Upside Foods and Vow, all of which have been cleared to sell cultivated meat in Singapore and/or the US.

“At the 200-litre scale, we successfully held media with some cells in there without contamination, but we usually ended up with [fewer] cells than we put in to begin with,” one former employee said.

Another explained that the company had proven “some cell growth” on a 20-litre scale, but it rarely ran the 200-litre bioreactor, noting that it usually failed due to contamination. “They just never had a properly defined process. We also had challenges with cleaning the bioreactors, and when we got the [larger] bioreactors from India, we had to assemble them ourselves, and some stuff was missing; they weren’t great.”

A fellow ex-staffer said these new bioreactors are just sitting there. “Omeat’s ultimate sin was spending all that money transitioning into the pilot plant before we were doing everything properly at lab scale. There was this pressure to scale, scale, scale when we were not ready,” they said. “Omeat isn’t ready to scale. The science isn’t quite ready, and it has effectively gone back into R&D mode, which makes sense.”

A toxic work culture and change in leadership

Courtesy: Omeat

It was around October that things began to heat up, with Omeat preparing to open its pilot plant but Khademhosseini still feeling progress was slow. He articulated that in a verbal attack on a business trip, which was filmed by employees.

“You guys have demonstrated nothing but incompetence,” he was reported as saying. “Do you want me to be saying: ‘Oh great job for failing for two years?’” The startup’s founder labelled assembled employees as “idiots”, saying he was “sick and tired of all you guys”.

“He just started unloading, he had a complete meltdown,” said one witness. Another added: “He would belittle the team and the PhD scientists. He put them under so much pressure that they would just tell him what he wanted to hear.”

Omeat claims a third-party investigation into the matter found no evidence of wrongdoing or unlawful conduct, but in November, Miller had taken the mantle of CEO. This was followed by layoff rounds earlier this year, with several employees resigning too.

“Ali requested that position shift and it was fully supported by the board. Ali is continuing to work with Omeat as a board member and a scientific advisor,” the company said. On the layoffs, it added: “Omeat had to make a difficult decision to trim the staff because the company believes that it can meet milestones of getting to commercial viability with a smaller staff. This is a testament to how the technology has been validated and is well-defined, and so the company no longer needs such a large R&D team.”

The statement also added that the tech “has been demonstrated at the 200-litre scale”, contrary to the claims of former employees.

“At Omeat, we strive to foster a positive work environment and culture that allows our employees to thrive and focus on the company’s business,” said Miller. “We remain intent on positioning the business to ensure the continued success of Omeat and our mission, including by continuing to secure new sources of funding.”

Omeat to announce new funding soon

Courtesy: Omeat

Khademhosseini explained the company had taken steps to control costs and extend its runway, revealing that it was closing in on another round of financing, with a “positive announcement” expected soon. So far, Omeat has raised $40M, including a $36.5M Series A in 2022.

“taken steps to control our costs and extend our runway while we secure our current round of fundraising”. He said: “We expect to make a further positive announcement on this soon.”

In terms of scalability, he claimed Omeat is executing its scale-up plan and that its core tech “remains sound”, adding that it’s dedicating additional resources to help generate sales of its FBS alternative. “Plenty has shown positive results through extensive independent testing by a number of research institutes. We are in the process of assembling these results and will be sharing the Plenty whitepaper publicly very soon,” he said.

“They are trying to raise money, but a lot of people are not willing to invest in alt-proteins right now,” one former employee said. “The capex required to pull this off at scale is in the hundreds of millions and that kind of money just doesn’t seem like it’s out there right now.” They likened it to a chicken and egg situation: “Generalist VCs aren’t going to be willing to invest until they see traction, and cultivated meat is not going to get traction without a whole bunch of capital.”

The global food tech sector saw VC funding drop by 49% in 2023, while financing for alternative proteins dipped by 44%, from $2.9B in 2022 to $1.6B in 2023. This was dominated by plant-based and fermentation startups, with cultivated meat startups only attracting $226M in capital last year (a far cry from the $922M the sector secured in 2022).

The industry has faced its fair share of challenges. Pioneers like Good Meat and Upside Foods have had to deal with financial and scalability hurdles, and Singapore’s Umami Bioworks and Shiok Meats have merged as a marker of consolidation in the category. Cultivated seafood player Finless Foods, meanwhile, recently initiated an alleged second round of layoffs in less than 12 months. The industry as a whole is facing political attacks and threats of bans – with Italy already passing a bill prohibiting domestic production or sale of cultivated meat.

So it’s not out of the ordinary that Omeat’s large-scale cutbacks will raise some alarm bells. However, there is cause for hope too, with Vow and Israel’s Aleph Farms both receiving regulatory approval this year, and Meatable hosting the EU’s first public tasting for cultivated meat last week. 2023 also saw 10 new cultivated meat facilities open, alongside several other alternative protein sites, a trend that can support an estimated 83 million jobs internationally by 2050.

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April 17, 2024

Exclusive: Meatable Hosts the EU’s First Public Tasting for Cultivated Meat at Dutch HQ

9 Mins Read
Dutch cultivated pork startup Meatable today hosted the first public tasting event for cultivated meat in the European Union, following approval from the newly formed safety assessment panel in the Netherlands. It comes ahead of its launch in Singapore restaurants later this year.

Months after the Netherlands established an expert committee to evaluate applications for cultivated meat tastings, Leiden-based producer Meatable has officially hosted the first such event in the EU, showcasing its hybrid pork sausages to chefs, journalists, industry stakeholders and public officials.

Held at its 3,300 sq m headquarters at the Bio Science Park in Leiden, the public tasting convened the likes of two-Michelin-starred chef Ron Blaauw, Dutch prince and special envoy Constantijn van Oranje Techleap, as well as RESPECTfarms founder Ira van Eelen (who is the daughter of Willem van Eelen, widely considered the godfather of cultivated meat).

Meatable is hoping to gauge feedback from the tastings to optimise its product as it awaits regulatory approval and market entry, starting with Singapore later this year. The startup has already held two tasting events in the city-state, and will roll out its cultivated pork sausages in select restaurants following the greenlight from the Singapore Food Agency.

The event comes after Dutch government had introduced a Code of Practice to approve tastings of cultivated meat and seafood back in July. Meatable was the first company to file a dossier to the expert panel installed by the Cellular Agriculture Netherlands Foundation in January. “We were thrilled to receive the go-ahead from the committee earlier this year, and are delighted that we can finally have people try our products in our home country,” Meatable co-founder and chief technology officer Daan Luining tells Green Queen.

Hybrid meats deliver on flavour and quality

Courtesy: Meatable

Meatable’s pork sausage is a hybrid meat product combining animal cells with plant-based ingredients. While it’s still under development and each tasting will inform the final product, the sausage presented at the tasting contained 28% cultivated pork fat.

The company’s decision to go down this route was strategic – hybrid meats have been touted by investors as the only way to make cultivated meat commercially feasible in the near term. Luining explains that while the company’s process can ultimately result in fully cultivated meat, the hybrid approach allows it to significantly increase the production output. He adds that this also delivers superior taste attributes over 100% plant-based analogues, and satisfies the quality expected by meat-eaters.

And that is evident in the reactions of the taste testers in Leiden. “I have already attended several tastings in other countries and have to say I found Meatable’s sausage to be remarkably delicious,” notes van Eelen, who called it a “huge step” for the sector.

“We trialled fully plant-based sausages to compare them to the sample with the cultivated pork fat,” writes Forbes’ Daniela De Lorenzo. “As [Meatable co-founder and CEO Krijn] de Nood told us, we shouldn’t be surprised it tastes like pork, which it really did.”

For the tasting, the cultivated sausage was cooked in a skillet over a stovetop by a professional chef, and served to attendees both on their own and as part of a bun. It was only the second tasting for cultivated meat in Europe, following Australian startup Vow’s event in Iceland in February (earlier this month, it received Singaporean approval for its cultivated quail).

Last week, British newspaper the Telegraph’s food critic, William Sitwell, claimed the company had rescinded an invitation to taste their sausages, suggesting that it wanted journalists who were familiar with the scientific and technical aspects of cultivated meat. Sitwell implied the startup was keeping food critics away, writing: “If you want to get the public champing on the bit, get the food critics on side first.”

On the contrary, Luining says critics are an “important part of our outreach and our tastings” as it closes in on commercialisation: “We believe that food critics and consumers alike should ultimately be part of the experience, and we very much value their opinions and feedback.”

It appears the Telegraph incident was the result of a miscommunication. “The tasting invitation was seemingly transferred to him [Sitwell] without our permission. While we had very limited availability for this tasting, we look forward to continuing to welcome more people to our tastings soon,” says Luining.

“Under the new Dutch regulations, we were only able to invite a few people in to taste our products under very controlled conditions, but look forward to expanding for future tastings,” he explains. “We see this as a really positive step forward for both Meatable and the industry at large.”

Traversing the regulatory waters

Courtesy: Meatable

Speaking of regulations, Meatable is working with food safety agencies across the world. Apart from filing for approval in Singapore last year, it has been in talks with both the US Department of Agriculture and the Food and Drug Administration, and hopes to enter the country in 2025. So far, only Eat JUST and UPSIDE Foods have been approved to sell cultivated meat in the US.

“By launching in Singapore first, we will be able to use the knowledge we get from that market for an effective US and then European launch later,” says Luining. The latter will no doubt be challenging, with the EU’s novel foods framework among the most stringent in the world. “In Europe, it’s a more complicated process. It can take years to receive approvals under the Novel Food Regulation, and the process also requires buy-in from all 27 member states,” he explains.

It’s the same reason why many companies target Singapore and the US first – the only other country to have greenlit these foods is Israel, who issued a ‘no questions’ letter to local cultivated beef producer Aleph Farms in January. It’s worth noting that Aleph Farms itself has filed for approval in Switzerland and the UK too, which aren’t part of the EU. The latter is expected to authorise the sale of cultivated cat food in the upcoming months.

“While we would love to move faster, we are using tastings like these in the Netherlands and Singapore to further inform us on product optimisation on our way to filing a dossier with the EFSA [European Food Safety Authority],” says Luining.

The other hurdle cultivated meat needs to clear is political. Legislators have been attempting to ban cultivated meat in the US and the EU, with Italy already having done so and Florida on the verge of it. These attempts have been criticised by alternative protein leaders, climate advocacy groups, and even the meat industry itself.

“Cultivated meat is a novel food and we understand that there are concerns about the impact it may have on farming and rural areas, especially in the US and EU,” Luining says. “But it’s important to note that we are not trying to replace these existing industries – we’re trying to create a more diversified and sustainable food supply chain.”

He adds: “Cultivated meat can exist next to plant-based alternatives and farm-raised meat. As the demand for meat is only forecasted to grow, the burden it places on our planet is clear. We believe that it is necessary to provide an alternative to people that still serves the appetite for real meat, without harming animals, people or the planet.”

Making cultivated meat faster than the rest

Courtesy: Meatable

Meatable, which has attracted $95M in investments since its inception in 2018, has multiple manufacturing setups that will enable it to produce cultivated pork at scale. In October 2022, it partnered with Singapore’s ESCO Aster, the world’s first regulator-approved contracted cultivated meat manufacturing facility. A month later, it announced a co-manufacturing deal with another Singaporean company, Love Handle, to open a Future of Meat Innovation Centre for hybrid meat.

It moved to its current facility in Leiden in November last year, moving up from 50-litre bioreactors to reach a capacity of 200 litres (potentially extending to 500 litres). “This is an important step for us in scaling up. Next to that, we have started production on the ground in Singapore,” Meatable COO Carolien Wilschut told Green Queen before the Leiden move.

Another aspect that will aid its scale-up efforts is its updated production process, which has cut its manufacturing time in half to just four days. This is possible due to its Opti-ox technology, which enables it to make products by isolating a single animal cell, without the need for fetal bovine serum. The process revolves around the use of pluripotent stem cells (PSCs), which – unlike immortalised cell lines that need to be altered to multiply indefinitely – have the natural ability to continue multiplying, and do so rapidly.

This is coupled with a perfusion process that allows the startup to work in a continuous cycle to generate very high cell densities, and can produce fully differentiated muscle and fat cells in just four days – 60 times faster than it takes to rear a pig for pork. The breakthrough means Meatable can make cultivated meat faster than anybody else.

Consumers will dictate the possibilities of cultivated meat

Courtesy: Meatable

At launch, the company is aiming to match the price point for high-end organic meats, with an ultimate path to price parity with conventionally farmed meat within the next few years. Holding public tasting events will help it finetune its sausage and gauge how consumers think about its product – but consumers’ appetite for cultivated meat can be mixed.

In the US, for example, one poll suggested that 45% are open to trying these foods. Similarly, 47% of Germans and 42% of Austrians are willing to eat them at least once. This falls to just over a third (34%) in the UK. In Singapore, acceptance for cultivated meat among those who have already tried is high, ranking 4.19 on a scale of 1 to 5 – buying and eating these products “significantly boosted” people’s acceptance, with diners expressing a strong willingness to try them again (a score of 4.41/5).

And another recent survey from the US shows that 60% of consumers would try cultivated pork in a restaurant, but this is much lower than the 88% who’d do so for conventional pork. “At this stage, it’s all about providing education about our product and its benefits. Once people have a chance to learn more about how it’s produced, and experience their first taste of a cultivated meat product, we believe people will be more willing to integrate it into their diet,” says Luining.

“In the end, we all know that the way we’re currently producing our food is not futureproof and recognise that cultivated meat can be part of the solution,” he adds. The Meatable co-founder hopes the Dutch tasting is the “first of many”, calling them “essential in helping us collect feedback for product optimization and an important part of education around cultivated meat”.

Speaking to Green Queen after its Singapore launch this month, Vow co-founder and CEO George Peppou suggested that we need to rethink cultivated meat. “Cultured meat only makes sense as a way to create new, delicious foods, not imitate the food we already know and love,” he said.

Luining agrees, reiterating that cultivated meat can co-exist with plant-based and farm-raised meat. “At Meatable, we are not trying to replace farm-raised meat; we’re trying to create additional options,” he outlines, adding that cultivated meat will be key in creating a cleaner planet for future generations. “In the end, consumers will ultimately choose how they want to experience the possibilities that cultivated meat presents.”

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April 17, 2024

Price Parity, Job Creation & Investment: Highlights from GFI’s Alt-Protein State of the Industry Reports 2024

7 Mins Read
Alternative protein think tank the Good Food Institute has released its annual State of the Industry series of reports, covering plant-based, cultivated and fermentation-derived proteins. Here are the key takeaways.

Political resistance and a drop in funding and sales were offset by a hike in manufacturing facilities, diverse partnerships, and regulatory approvals in the alternative protein world last year, according to the 2023 State of the Industry reports by the Good Food Institute (GFI).

Comprising plant-based, cultivated and fermented proteins, the reports outline the progress, challenges, and future of the industry. Globally, retail sales for plant-based meat, seafood and dairy saw a slight increase, from $28B in 2022 to $29B in 2023. But the road towards taste and price parity, improved accessibility, better nutrition, and significant market penetration remains lengthy, with GFI comparing this to Hofstadter’s Law.

Coined by scientist Douglas Hofstadter, it reads: “It always takes longer than you expect, even when you take into account Hofstadter’s Law.” It’s meant to describe the difficulty of estimating how much time it will take to complete complex tasks. “As Hofstadter’s Law and similar adages dictate, this will take time,” says GFI business analyst Daniel Gartner, drawing parallels with alternative protein’s progress. “However, keep our eyes on the goal post and the vision all of us in this industry are working towards – a brighter food future for people and the planet.”

Here are the key highlights from the 2023 State of the Industry reports:

Plant-based milk on the up, but meat and seafood suffer

Courtesy: GFI

The plant-based food market in the US saw $8.1B in dollar sales in 2023, down by 2% from the year before. This meant the industry represented 1.1% of the overall food sector’s sales. But looking at longer-term trends, global sales for plant-based meat have nearly tripled from $2.2B in 2014 to $6.4B in 2023.

For plant-based meat and seafood, the decline was larger, representing the macroeconomic challenges faced by the category. Here, US retail dollar sales fell by 12% to $1.2B. Sales for conventional meat and seafood, in comparison, flatlined – but the average price per unit was only up by 3%, compared to 9% for plant-based analogues, which now make up 0.9% of the overall meat market. Burger patties are the most popular, followed by nuggets, tenders and wings, and grounds.

Things were slightly more positive on the plant-based milk side of things, where sales grew slightly by 1% to reach $2.9B and take up 14.5% of the overall milk sector in the US. Almond is still king, capturing 56% of the market, with oat continuing its ascendancy (24%).

When it comes to consumer adoption, 62% of households bought vegan products, with meat and seafood reaching 15% of homes, and milk 44%. Encouragingly, the repeat purchase rates were high at 81% for the entire category, 79% for milk, and 62% for meat and seafood analogues.

Beef is closest to price parity, eggs farthest

Courtesy: GFI

GFI notes that the price gap between plant-based and conventional proteins is still a significant purchase barrier, outlining that grocery costs were the key economic concern for consumers last year. And 2023 was challenging for the vegan sector in this aspect – while plant-based foods saw a lower price growth than the overall food sector and some conventional categories in 2022, the former’s markups were higher in 2023.

From 2021 to 2023, plant-based meat and seafood’s average price per unit rose by 17%, compared to 16% for their conventional counterparts. Last year, the average price premium for plant-based meat and seafood was 77%. That said, beef is currently the vegan analogue that’s closest to price parity, with plant-based versions costing $7.48 per pound, versus $6.24 for the same amount of animal-derived beef – a 20% difference.

The gap is much larger in other categories. For milk, this comes to 104%, while eggs have the highest price premium at 317%. Even other meat categories need to bridge this gap, with vegan chicken costing 156% more, pork 177% and turkey 214%.

Alternative protein investments underestimated

Courtesy: GFI

A host of reports over the last few months have showcased the dire situation of VC funding in the food tech sector. Globally, agrifood tech companies brought in 49% less capital in 2023 than the year before, according to one report.

The data cited by GFI signals a 42% in overall VC investment across all sectors, with a 40% drop in climate tech, 51% fall in fintech, and 61% decline in food tech financing. For alternative protein companies too, funding dipped by 44% from $2.9B in 2022 to $1.6B in 2023. This was dominated by plant-based startups ($907M), followed by fermentation ($515M) and cultivated meat ($226M) companies. Collectively, these sectors have secured $15.7B in all-time investment.

“The sales and investment slowdowns in 2023 weren’t unique to the alternative protein industry, but as a relatively nascent sector relying on private investments to navigate early-stage operations and strong sales performance to secure favourable placements on retail shelves, they played outsized roles in the sector’s 2023 performance,” writes Gartner.

But GFI suggests that these totals are likely understated, with some funding rounds not publicly disclosed. While that is the case for certain deals in general anyway, this year may have had a higher frequency due to a large number of simple agreements for future equity (SAFE) and bridge rounds, and based on its conversations with market participants. Some of these rounds may be reported this year.

Despite that, investments in Europe actually increased for the second consecutive year, reaching $584M (up by 74%), a record total for the region. It was the first time European investments comprised over half of all invested capital in the plant-based industry.

Legislative wins and challenges for alternative protein

Courtesy: New Culture

Despite the private investment dip, public financing for these sectors matched the record levels of 2022. Canada announced C$150M for Protein Industries Canada, Germany set aside €38M in its federal budget for a sustainable protein transition, the US committed $40M in fermentation funding over four years, and the UK injected £15.4M in multiple cultivated meat projects.

However, GFI noted that total public investment in 2023 only met a tiny fraction of the estimated $10.1B in annual support needed to realise the full potential of alternative proteins.

It has been a rollercoaster year in terms of regulation for cultivated meat and precision fermentation. The US joined Singapore as the second country to allow the sale of cultivated meat. Israeli precision fermentation company Remilk received a ‘no further questions’ letter from the FDA to cement its Generally Recognized as Safe (GRAS), while The Every Co obtained its third such certification in late 2023. Imagindairy and TurtleTree, meanwhile, earned self-affirmed GRAS status (with a ‘no further questions’ letter coming in January this year for the former).

Since then, Israel has also joined the list of countries that have approved cultivated meat, while Singapore issued its second certification earlier this month. Precision fermentation companies like New Culture, The Protein Brewery, Vivici and Oobli have achieved some form of GRAS status in the US too.

But there have been challenges as well, with Florida on the verge of banning cultivated meat, and Alabama, Arizona, Wisconsin, Texas, Nebraska and Tennessee all proposing similar bills. Across the Atlantic, Italy became the first country to ban cultivated meat, while a group of countries asked the EU to rethink its already-stringent novel foods regulations. France and Romania are also considering a ban on these proteins.

More facilities, more jobs

Courtesy: Meatable

In spite of the tough funding environment and legislative challenges, there has been an increase in both the number of companies and production facilities for alternative proteins. There are now 174 businesses working on cultivated meat across the supply chain (up from 166 in 2022), and 158 on fermentation-based proteins (versus 136 in 2022).

Meanwhile, 2023 saw 10 new cultivated meat facilities open, while seven fermentation plants began operating too. And several more sites were announced across the alt-protein spectrum too. According to the ClimateWorks Foundation and the Global Methane Hub, this trend means the industry could support up to 83 million jobs internationally by 2050.

“However, the alternative protein sector is not yet positioned to capture those levels of economic impact,” notes Gertner. “The plant-based, fermentation, and cultivated industries exist in distinct stages of industry development, but the average quality and availability of alternative protein products do not yet meet consumer expectations. To approach significant market penetration levels, alternative protein companies need to continue to improve product cost, taste and volumes.”

He implores governments, companies and investors to dedicate more research and investment towards alternative proteins, if they’re “serious about improving food security, reducing emissions, and achieving climate goals”. “By scaling, reducing costs, and improving taste and texture, alternative proteins – alongside other advances and innovations –can continue to shape the future of food and agriculture,” he said.

The post Price Parity, Job Creation & Investment: Highlights from GFI’s Alt-Protein State of the Industry Reports 2024 appeared first on Green Queen.

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