Israel’s Pluri has secured a $6.5M investment and entered the cell-based chocolate space with the impending purchase of a majority stake in Rehovot-based Kokomodo.
After innovating with cultivated meat and lab-grown coffee, Haifa-based firm Pluri is dipping into cell-based chocolate.
The cellular agriculture specialist has acquired at least 71% of fellow Israeli company Kokomodo, which makes cell-cultured cocoa, in a transaction with $4.5M.
Pluri is purchasing these shares from Chutzpah Holdings and Plantae, both of which are under the control of health and tech investor Alejandro Weinstein, who has concurrently poured $6.5M into Pluri’s business.
“Pluri has already demonstrated the great potential of cell-based technologies to drive innovation forward in both the regenerative medicine and agtech space,” Weinstein said. “Sustainable and scalable food production is a global priority. I believe that these transactions mark the beginning of a powerful partnership.”
Pluri diversifies cell ag platform
Courtesy: Pluri
Listed on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (TASE) and Nasdaq, Pluri began as a health tech company in 2001, specialising in stem cell therapy for disease treatments.
Pluri recently expanded its horizons into food and manufacturing, creating cultivated meat startup Ever After Foods in a joint venture with food giant Tnuva in 2022. The firm is working on beef, poultry and seafood cell lines, and offers a 90% reduction in costs for B2B clients.
Meanwhile, early last year, it expanded into cell-based coffee under the new PluriAgTech vertical, which uses breakthrough cell tech to create eco-friendly alternatives to carbon-intensive foods. This project was spun out into a subsidiary called Coffeesai, and the company is targeting regulatory approval in the US via the FDA’s GRAS (Generally Recognized as Safe) pathway.
The investment from Weinstein is expected to close at the end of this month, and is aimed at strengthening Pluri’s balance sheet and supporting innovation and strategic growth across its cell-based tech platform. The firm added that it will use the funds for working capital and general corporate purposes.
“We believe that Mr Weinstein’s equity investment will strengthen our financial foundation and allow us to advance our entry into the cultivated cacao market, with the goal of positioning Pluri as a leader in this sector, where demand is growing and alternative agricultural solutions are needed to feed our global population,” said Pluri CEO Yaky Yanay.
Banking on the climate-friendly chocolate ecosystem
Courtesy: Kokomodo
Both the investment and the Kokomodo deal are subject to approval from Pluri’s shareholders, as well as the European Investment Bank, Nasdaq, and TASE.
Kokomodo came out of stealth last summer with a $750,000 investment from The Kitchen FoodTech Hub and the Israeli Innovation Authority, working to produce cell-based cocoa for the food and beverage, supplements, and cosmetics industries.
The startup uses cells from premium cocoa beans grown in Central and South America and has successfully completed lab-scale production. It has been working to get closer to price parity with conventional chocolate and indicated that a US launch may be on the cards first.
With the impending acquisition – expected to close during Q2 this year – Pluri is looking to drive the growth and expansion of Kokomodo’s operations by leveraging its cultivated cacao solutions to “capitalise on the growing demand for sustainable food technologies”. The deal is also set to strengthen Pluri’s strategic growth and operational capabilities.
“The synergy between Kokomodo’s advancements in cell line development and Pluri’s industrial-scale production creates a strong foundation for innovation, positioning the company to lead the field of cultivated cacao and set new benchmarks in cultivated cacao technologies,” noted Yanay.
Kokomodo is among several firms working to futureproof the $120B chocolate industry, which has a significant impact on the planet. A bar of chocolate requires 1,700 litres of water on average, and growing demand for land has meant that 94% and 80% of deforestation in Ghana and Ivory Coast, respectively, is ascribed to cocoa. In fact, dark chocolate is amongst the most polluting foods (behind only beef).
Meanwhile, the climate crisis is wiping out cocoa yields and hiking up prices, which shot up three to fourfold last year to reach all-time highs, just as global cocoa stocks have dropped to their lowest levels. If things remain the way they are, a third of the world’s cocoa trees might die out by 2050.
Aside from Kokomodo, Swiss startup Food Brewer, US player California Cultured, and fellow Israeli firm Celleste Bio are all developing cell-based chocolate. Others, however, are using more planet-friendly ingredients to make cocoa-free alternatives to chocolate, such as Voyage Foods (US), Planet A Foods (Germany), Win-Win (UK), and Foreverland (Italy).
With Donald Trump having returned to office, 2025 could be a bumper year for cultivated meat bans in the US – here are the countries that could benefit from these policies.
Within a day of returning to the presidency, Donald Trump withdrew the US from the Paris Agreement yet again, promised to “drill, baby, drill” by invoking a national energy emergency (despite being the world’s largest oil and gas producer), promised to end the Green New Deal, and ordered the elimination of government offices that protect vulnerable communities from pollution.
None of this was unexpected, though for many around the world, it was jarring. After an administration that pumped more money into dealing with climate change than ever before, Trump’s complete one-eighty on day one is a harbinger of dark times to come in the climate fight.
One climate-related issue that has sparked a culture war in the country is meat-eating. Americans eat way more meat than recommended, and 99% of it comes from factory farms. Despite that, the backlash against novel proteins like cultivated meat is incendiary.
The states of Florida and Alabama have both officially banned cultivated meat, while lawmakers in a dozen others – including Arizona, Illinois, Nebraska, New York, Pennsylvania, and Texas – have attempted to do the same.
Trump hasn’t been shy about his love for meat, nor has his infamous mega donor Elon Musk. Vice-president JD Vance has previously gone on a tirade about “disgusting fake meat”, calling it “highly processed garbage”, and Robert F Kennedy Jr – who could become the next US health secretary – has likened it to the ultra-processed food that he hates.
There are rumours that RFK Jr might ban cultivated meat, though he’s actually more likely to just make it harder for companies to receive approval from the Food and Drug Administration and Department of Agriculture to sell these products in the country.
If Kennedy puts up those barriers, and more states succeed in banning cultivated meat, it would force cultivated meat companies to look away from the US and towards more receptive countries.
The US was the second nation to greenlight these products for sale, with California’s Upside Foods and Eat Just both receiving approval for their cultivated chicken products in 2023. That feels like a long time ago, and it’s worth wondering whether it was an outlier.
The new US administration’s distaste for cultivated meat could bring significant opportunities for other countries that would look to capitalise by offering a friendly regulatory environment for alternative protein producers.
For example, in a recent newsletter, alternative protein think tank the Good Food Institute APAC predicted that 2025 would likely “go in the history books as the year that cultivated meat went from being an exotic dish only available in business hubs like Singapore and Hong Kong, to an emerging technology explored by innovators across Asia-Pacific”.
“Our experts are optimistic that this year will include the first-ever market approvals in South Korea and Australia/New Zealand (which share a regulatory body). It’s possible that Thailand could follow suit,” the think tank suggested.
Here are the nations that could be the biggest winners.
Singapore
Courtesy: Eat Just
Widely recognised as a future food leader, Singapore was the first country to approve the sale of cultivated meat back in 2020 (for Eat Just) and has since granted clearance to cultured quail and foie gras from Australia’s Vow. It’s also assessing applications from a host of other startups, including Mosa Meat, Meatable, Vital Meat, and Aleph Farms.
The city-state’s leadership in this sector has drawn the attention of other countries too, which have floated the idea of using Singapore’s approval as a benchmark to greenlight products within their own borders (the way Hong Kong has done with Vow).
Cultivated meat producers are taking note of this, with Meatable telling Green Queen that it hoped to use this system of international cooperation to obtain approval in five to six countries by the end of the year.
The country’s new Food Safety and Security Bill officially describes novel foods and codifies the existing regulatory framework to make it easier for producers to commercialise. Expect more companies to look to Singapore in the wake of any anti-cultivated-meat legislation in the US.
UK
Courtesy: Ivy Farm Technologies
Long been bound by EU regulations, the UK took major strides last year to break away from pre-Brexit rules and establish itself as a regulatory leader in the sector. The Food Standards Agency has suggested it would establish the international cooperation framework too, working with not just Singapore, but also the likes of Australia, New Zealand and potentially others.
In October, the government poured £1.6M into the FSA to create a first-of-its-kind regulatory ‘sandbox’ for cultivated meat producers, which is built to speed up the timeline and lower the costs related to regulatory clearance.
This year, the FSA will create a new public register for novel food approvals to replace the existing system of requiring a statutory instrument, which adds up to six months to a process that already takes over two and a half years. It will also do away with the need for renewals of approvals every 10 years, which currently add to the agency’s crowded backlog.
The EU has been a frustrating market for cultivated meat players. Its novel food regulations – among the strictest and most complex globally – have deterred companies from filing dossiers. Morever, startups have told us that they want to make sure they get their dossier right because timelines are so long. In terms of political and cultural buy-in, the bloc is a bit of a mixed bag. While the world’s first cultivated meat product was born in the EU (Dutch startup Mosa Meat’s 2013 burger), it is home to the first national ban on cultivated meat (in Italy), and has faced several other attempts from the likes of France, Romania and Hungary.
Homegrown companies have usually looked to places like Singapore or the US for market entry, but could the developments in the latter finally accelerate progress in the EU? Gourmey became the first to apply for regulatory approval from the European Food Safety Authority in July, and this week, Mosa Meat did so too.
Meanwhile, the EU Commission has rejected Hungary’s argument justifying a ban on cultivated meat, alongside member states like Czechia, Lithuania, Sweden, and the Netherlands – signalling a slightly more positive state of affairs for novel foods in the region.
Israel
Courtesy: Aleph Farms
After Singapore and the US, Israel was the third country to approve cultivated meat, giving the go-ahead to Aleph Farms in December 2023. The nation has been adjudged to be one of the global hotbeds of alternative protein innovation – it’s home to over 70 future food startups, accounted for 10% of investment in the industry in 2023, and is set to generate 10,000 new jobs and $2.5B in economic benefits by 2030.
While progress has been halted due to the current war in Gaza, which is still ongoing, the ceasefire has brought respite and hopes of an end to the long-running dispute. While there’s still a long way to go, it could potentially spark a regulatory revival in Israel for novel foods.
China
Courtesy: Eat Just
Many US politicians have already taken aim at China as one of its major rivals, but the country’s dominance in sectors like manufacturing, electric mobility, and biotechnology has left even Republicans – famously against cultivated meat – wondering whether it’s time to embrace these novel proteins.
Cultivated meat companies benefit from much lower production costs in the East Asian country, compared to Europe or the US, as well as friendly policies. China’s five-year agricultural plan (running until 2026) calls for research into proteins like cultivated meat, while the 2020 Green Biological Manufacturing initiative set aside ¥20M ($3M at the time) in funding for plant-based and cultivated meat research.
This hasn’t gone unnoticed in the US. Nearly a dozen Republican Congress members sent a letter to the director of national intelligence and the USDA’s director of homeland security a few months ago, asking them to analyse the potential impact of China’s advancements on the global food system, and urging the US to take action to maintain leadership and resilience in the biotech sector.
Thailand
Courtesy: Sakchai Lalit/AP
While it may fly under the radar for some, Thailand has been steadily building its cultivated meat ecosystem over the years. Over the last three decades, meat consumption in Thailand has skyrocketed by 180%, doubling the amount of land used for livestock farming, but two-thirds of locals are looking to put less meat on their plates, primarily for health reasons.
And while research suggests that just a quarter of Thailand’s population is aware of cultivated meat, one poll found that 97% of Thai consumers want to try these proteins.
Aleph Farms is already building the country’s first manufacturing facility for cultivated meat and recently held a tasting event for industry professionals in Bangkok. The startup also worked with seafood giant Thai Union to submit a regulatory dossier to the National Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology in December.
South Korea
Courtesy: Simple Planet
Policy support for cultivated meat has come a long way in South Korea. A year after the opening of the $7M North Gyeongsang Cellular Agriculture Industry Support Center, the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety established a framework for regulatory approval of these proteins.
The government also created a regulation-free special zone for the development of cultivated foods. The ₩20B ($14M) project harbours 10 companies working to commercialise these proteins. And the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries is investing ₩29B ($21M) in research funding for plant-based and cultivated seafood technologies.
With 90% of Koreans willing to try cultivated meat, and two in five in favour of it being sold at supermarkets and restaurants, the potential for this industry in South Korea is high. Seoul-based startup Simple Planet has indicated that it aims to obtain the regulatory greenlight for its cultivated meat this year.
Australia and New Zealand
Courtesy: Vow
Another regulatory assessing Vow’s application is Food Standards Australia New Zealand. While the process started in early 2023 and has been protracted, the joint regulator closed a second round of public consultation for its filing just before Christmas, proposing a new standards-based approach. At this stage, it won’t be a surprise if the agency gives the greenlight within the year.
Fellow Australian startup Magic Valley is also working closely with the Antipodean regulator on the compliance and safety of its cultivated pork, and has previously suggested that it could commercially launch the product this year.
These innovations would appeal to the 21% of Australians who describe themselves as ‘meat reducers’. Four in 10 say they are cutting back on meat, or have reduced or eliminated it altogether. And another survey shows that more than half of these consumers are open to trying culrivated meat.
Seattle startup Atomo Coffee has raised $7.8M in Series B funding to ramp up sales of its 50:50 beanless coffee blend via international partnerships.
A leader in the bean-free coffee space, Atomo has secured $7.8M from investors in its latest fundraising round; so far the startup has raked in nearly $59M in investment.
The company will use the capital to expand the reach of its Remix product, a 50:50 blend of conventional coffee and its beanless innovation, with an eye on international horizons.
“Many coffee companies are exploring how to incorporate beanless coffee into their product offerings to ensure they can create consistently great tasting coffee at an affordable price for consumers,” Atomo CEO Andy Kleitsch told GeekWire, which first reported the news.
Blended approach can support coffee farmers
Courtesy: Devin Pabingwit | Composite by Green Queen
Kleitsch founded Atomo with Jarret Stopforth in 2019, starting with beanless cold brews, before moving on to powdered formats for filter coffee and espresso.
Its current mix includes a combination of upcycled date pits, ramon, fenugreek and sunflower seeds, millets, lemon, guava, carrots, strawberry and potato fibre, black aronia berries, green bananas, and fructose (with caffeine from green tea).
The company takes date pits from Coachella Valley farmers destined to be thrown or burnt and cleans, washes, dries and granulates them to use in its roastery. These are then infused in a marinade made from the other ingredients, and then heated in a cross-Maillard reaction to produce the coffee compounds.
Atomo’s coffee is available at all 58 locations of the speciality coffee chain Bluestone Lane, as well as 13 other locations in the US.
Last year, it expanded internationally through partnerships with London’s Hagen Espresso Bar, as well as Japan’s Post Coffee and zero-waste café Ash. It has a collaboration with a premium ice cream brand planned for this spring.
Courtesy: Atomo
A common criticism of beanless coffee is the impact on farmers – the industry has 125 million people whose livelihoods depend on the crop. Atomo addresses this issue on its website, noting that a transition to a scale large enough to displace farmers (which it states isn’t its goal) is very unlikely.
“Coffee consumption worldwide is growing at a rapid pace forcing coffee farmers to increase production,” the company says. “To increase production along with changing climate conditions is forcing them to expand their growing areas which leads to deforestation and increased water consumption.”
The Remix blend that Atomo launched last year is a testament to this approach. It combines beanless coffee with conventional beans for use in drip coffee, and blind taste tests found that people preferred this over Starbucks filter coffee by a 2:1 ratio.
Atomo also sells a Flagstaff Remix made exclusively for Bluestone Lane, as well as an espresso-focused Coachella Latte blend.
Capital raise could help fund large-scale facility
Courtesy: Our World in Data
The food tech startup is among several others working on coffee alternatives. A water-guzzling crop, growing coffee produces more emissions than pork, shrimp, rice and cheese. It’s also one of the most climate-vulnerable commodities – the area suitable for growing arabica could be cut in half by 2050, which puts it among the 60% of endangered coffee species.
Extreme weather events, combined with increasing demand, are leading to crop failures and shortages, pushing up arabica prices by 80% last year, with wholesale prices reaching a nearly 50-year high. As a commodity, coffee was the second-largest gainer (behind chocolate) across the value chain last year.
Startups like Minus, Voyage Foods, Atomo, Prefer, and Northern Wonder also make beanless coffee, and Pluri and Stem are working on cell-based versions. Amaterra, meanwhile, is leveraging molecular biology and crop genetics to develop perennial coffee varieties. And even giants like Starbucks and Nestlé have developed coffee varieties that can better withstand climate change.
Kleitsch told GeekWire that its blended coffee enables cafés and roasters “to launch their most sustainable products, maintain excellent coffee taste and reduce their overall ingredient costs”.
Courtesy: Atomo Coffee
Analysis from sustainability research firm HowGood has shown that Atomo’s Coachella Latte generates 83% fewer carbon emissions and uses 70% less farmland compared to conventional coffee.
In its effort to scale up production and expand its presence, the company opened a 33,000 sq ft roastery in April, which can produce four million lbs of beanless coffee every year – enough to supply around 2,000 coffee shops.
Atomo hoped the roastery would create enough buzz that it could support a capital raise for the construction of a larger facility, with the capacity of producing 40 million lbs of product annually. This $7.8M injection is likely a realisation of that goal.
Nourish Ingredients CEO James Petrie explores the decline of VC investment in food tech, and how the sector can chart a course forward.
As we navigate through what some might call a “food tech funding winter,” I find myself in an interesting position as both a founder and industry participant. The headlines are hard to miss: down rounds, struggling valuations and a general pullback in investment across all sectors and, most notably, food tech. Yet, as someone deeply embedded in this space, I see a stark contrast between current market dynamics and the long-term inevitability of industry direction. More importantly, I believe that investors see this too.
The fundamental transformation of our food system isn’t a question of if but when. The current market correction is real and necessary but it is important to distinguish between cyclical challenges and the undeniable momentum of an industry addressing one of humanity’s most pressing challenges – feeding a fast-growing global middle-class population.
The Great De-Unicorning
Courtesy: GFI
The food tech sector, particularly in plant-based and precision fermentation, is experiencing a significant correction. We’re seeing companies that once commanded huge valuations facing massive down rounds or recapitalisations. Investment in the plant protein sector was particularly enthusiastic in recent years and we have seen expectations return to earth with a thud.
Similarly, the precision fermentation space faces challenges because of the sector’s capital-intensive nature. This has created understandable caution among investors. These are the growing pains of an emerging industry learning to balance ambition with execution, needing to rein in their capital plans to better balance their revenue forecast.
The days of raising significant capital on potential alone are behind us. That is not necessarily a bad thing for a sector that badly needs to mature. Investors have shifted their focus from promises of transformational products toward clear, tangible paths to revenue and offtake deals. This creates a particular challenge for companies that have blown their wad on CapEx before firming up customer demand, but this simultaneously creates opportunities for those willing to be patient and strategic.
Follow the trend
Courtesy: Nourish Ingredients
It is important to distinguish between a correction and a trend. I believe that investment in the food tech space is fundamentally sound because the drivers for food tech solutions are not cyclical. Rather, they are existential and inevitable. Climate change is not a theoretical dragon on the map but is beginning to bite and we are starting to see permanent shifts in food production practices.
Traditional food supply chains are showing their vulnerabilities, from extreme weather events disrupting agriculture, to water stress, to decreasing herd sizes in many parts of the world. “Peak milk” is something you will hear about in the coming years and this is just one example of how resource constraints are limiting conventional food production.
Meeting consumer expectations without sacrifice
Courtesy: Nourish Ingredients
Our global middle classes are expanding rapidly and these people want to eat animal products. Unfortunately, the math is simple but stark in its lack of scalability: Animal agriculture consumes 77% of agricultural land but produces only 17% of our food. This isn’t only about market timing; it’s about physics, chemistry and biology.
How do we meet the growing demand? How do we meet not only calorie and nutrient requirements but also give these people the foods they want to eat? The answer lies in deep tech, in clever ways of stretching out existing animal food supplies by supplementing the growth-limiting ‘sub-ingredients’ that are currently difficult or impossible to replace without losing authenticity. Blended or hybrid foods are a massive market opportunity that helps us address new demand with climate-resilient supply.
A new playbook
Courtesy: Nourish Ingredients
And so we return to investment in these tangible market opportunities. Commercial traction – real customers making real commitments – should top the list of investor requirements. Strategic partnerships and offtake agreements are particularly telling; they indicate that established players see enough value to put skin in the game, even ahead of full-scale commercial readiness. The best technology in the world means nothing without a validated path to commercial adoption.
Historical parallels are telling here. Every transformative industry has gone through periods of correction and consolidation. Current valuations, while challenging, create attractive entry points for new investors.
So, what’s next?
Courtesy: Nourish Ingredients
Success in this environment requires a laser focus on solving real problems. At Nourish Ingredients, we’ve doubled down on developing solutions that address specific industry challenges, particularly around taste and functionality and building commercial relationships early on in our journey.
The ability to tell the right story – one grounded in reality but also inspirational – has never been more important. The companies that emerge strongest from this period will be those that have combined technical innovation with commercial execution, supported by investors who understand the sector’s deep drivers and potential and, most importantly, can see beyond the reset.
San Francisco’s New Culture has submitted the product label for its mozzarella – made from animal-free casein – for review to the state of California.
As it gears up for commercialisation, precision fermentation player New Culture has revealed the ingredient list of its cow-free mozzarella.
The fermentation-derived cheese features the startup’s flagship recombinant casein protein, which is mixed with water, sunflower and coconut oils, salt, sugar, starch, and fortifying minerals. Asked what starch the company uses, co-founder and CSO Inja Radman told Green Queen: “it’s a standard food starch.”
She adds: “New Culture animal-free casein is what’s responsible for the taste, functionality and performance of our cheese. It’s what sets our product apart from every single plant-based cheese in the world.”
The announcement of the ingredients comes after the food tech startup submitted the product label and registration for its mozzarella for review to the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CFDA), which it says is the first instance of an animal-free casein submission to the agency.
“Reaching the point of submitting our product label and registration to CDFA represents an important maturation and a readiness as a company to bring our product to market,” explains Radman.
Targeting a broad range of consumers with nutritional parity
Courtesy: New Culture
New Culture is making a cow-free version of the main dairy protein via precision fermentation, which combines the process of traditional fermentation with the latest advances in biotechnology to efficiently produce a compound of interest, such as a protein, flavour molecule, vitamin, pigment, or fat.
Casein – a $2.7B market – is responsible for emulsification, stabilisation and gelation, among other features, helping cheese melt, stretch, bubble and brown. But being a dairy protein, it has a detrimental impact on the environment, while requiring a vast amount of land and water.
This is why New Culture uses precision fermentation, which allows it to make a bioidentical version of casein for use in products like mozzarella.
The ingredient list for the startup’s mozzarella helps match its nutritional profile with conventional cheese and outperforms many vegan options too on nutrients too. While typical plant-based cheese contains no protein and up to 8g of carbohydrates, and cow-derived mozzarella has 6g of protein and less than 1g of carbs, New Culture’s precision-fermented version has 5g of protein and 2g of carbs.
Courtesy: New Culture
It’s also a complete protein source and is free from soy, nuts and gluten. “From a nutritional perspective, New Culture cheese has very broad appeal across a range of consumer segments,” says Radman.
“For some consumers, the high (and complete) protein and low carbohydrate content will stand out. For others, including those with allergies, being free from cholesterol, lactose, soy, nuts and gluten is going to be attractive. For others, it’ll be the lack of trace hormones and antibiotics. Being able to appeal to so many consumer groups is a huge benefit of our product.”
A survey by New Culture found that 80% of people are interested in its animal-free cheese eat animal products, and early adopters are happy to pay $4 more per pizza with the company’s cheese. But despite the functional and nutritional promise, products like animal-free mozzarella will only work on a mass scale if their costs come down.
To do so, the startup has partnered with South Korean food giant CJ CheilJedang (an investor in New Culture) on a manufacturing deal aimed at reaching commodity pricing for its casein. Last month, it revealed that its cheese now needs just 28% of casein – less than half as much as conventional mozzarella – allowing it to lower the product’s price.
New Culture in talks with pizza chains and indie shops
Courtesy: New Culture
Last February, New Culture became the first company to obtain self-affirmed GRAS (Generally Recognized as Safe) status for animal-free casein in the US, enabling it to sell its protein to manufacturers and its mozzarella to restaurants.
One of those restaurants is Nancy Silverton’s Pizzeria Mozza in Los Angeles, where the firm showcased its mozzarella as part of a pilot in 2023. The eatery will also be host to the product’s full market debut, though the launch timeline has been delayed.
“The entire New Culture team is extremely eager to get our cheese into Nancy Silverton’s Pizzeria Mozza. With the label and registration submission to CDFA, we’re one giant step closer. We’re working with CDFA to secure the necessary approvals and will share more details on [the] launch as soon as we can,” says Radman.
And it’s not just Pizzeria Mozza that New Culture. “If there’s one thing we know, it’s that pizzerias desperately want our cheese. We’re in conversation with pizzerias of all sorts, all across the country, from nationwide chains to family-run independents, from NY-style pizzas to Neapolitan, Detroit, tavern, grandma, and beyond,” she reveals.
Courtesy: New Culture
There are several startups working on precision-fermented casein, including Standing Ovation, Those Vegan Cowboys, Change Foods, Zero Cow Factory, and Fermify. But New Culture – which has raised $28.5M in venture capital and is currently fundraising – has the advantage of being one of only two companies (alongside Fermify) to be cleared to sell the protein in the US.
“Commercialisation is a multifaceted process. It’s much more than just having a great product. It’s an organisational mindset shift,” says Radman. “And from an operational standpoint, [the label submission] means we’ve ironed out some very important production and formulation details.”
She adds: “In terms of timing, we don’t have specifics, but are eager to work with CDFA to wrap up the approvals as quickly as possible.”
Our weekly column rounds up the latest sustainable food innovation news. This week, Future Food Quick Bites covers Lidl’s new plant-based range, a vegan workplace canteen, and the UK House of Lords’s nod to cultivated meat.
New products and launches
Discount retailer Lidl has unveiled 28 new affordable plant-based products in the UK, which include Meat Free Cordon Bleu, Barista Oat Milk, and Smoked Tofu. The range starts from £1.09.
Courtesy: Lidl
Also in the UK, plant-based milk brand Mighty has added caramel and chocolate flavours to its oat milk powder range.
British foodservice wholesaler Brakes has extended its plant-based range with nearly 40 new products and created a Vegan Hub for Veganuary.
London-based Tofu Vegan, a popular Chinese restaurant chain, has opened its fifth location on Gloucester Road.
Across the Atlantic, tofu maker Hodo has announced a retail expansion into Meijer, Harris Teeter, and Giant Martin’s.
New York-based Edenesque has launched a barista edition of its pistachio milk, which is available at Whole Foods Market, on its webstore, and at Joe Coffee for $7.99 per carton.
AI-led ingredient discovery company Shiru has put out a partnership call to beverage manufacturers for the development and scale-up of a natural sugar replacer.
Popular fast-food chain Slutty Vegan has opened a new Bar Vegan location in Baltimore’s Rye Street Market, which is part of the Baltimore Peninsula District development.
Ingredients giant Griffith Foods has launched an Alternative Proteins Portfolio to complement its range of plant-based seasonings, sauces, dressings, binders, coatings, and all-in-one mixes.
Dutch vegan food distributor GreenPro International has rebranded to Plantitude to solidify its role as the “connecting factor in the protein transition”.
Crafty Counter has introducedEggless Salad under its vegan Wundereggs brand, which is available at all Safeway and Albertsons stores across Idaho and Washington state.
Meanwhile, Emirates Airlines has introduced a range of vegan meals for children, including pizza, vegetable fajitas, cauliflower bites and strawberry crumble. It adds to the carrier’s 300-plus plant-based options.
Aussie plant-based player v2food has unveiled a new identity for Soulara, the ready meal brand it acquired in January.
Courtesy: Soulara
And in India, vegan startup Blue Tribe Foods – backed by cricketer Virat Kohli and actor Anushka Sharma – has rolled out sweet potato fries, which are available at online retailers like Zepto, Swiggy Instamart, and Blinkit.
Company and finance updates
Belgian agrifood company Arvesta has opened Nuverta, a plant-based protein facility in Mettet, which will initially produce pea protein concentrate.
British green energy innovator Ecotricity, owned by Dale Vince, has opened what it says is the country’s first fully vegan workplace canteen.
The University of Nottingham has partnered with UK plant-based food company Jampa’s and Canadian manufacturer Tartistes to develop next-gen vegan products, receiving funding from the UK-Canada Innovate UK scheme.
Courtesy: Heura
Spanish vegan meat startup Heura has opened a new innovation lab in Barcelona’s 22@ tech district, and plans to register six more patents over the next nine months, adding to the innovations it announced late last year.
Slovenian plant-based food producer Narayan Group is set to be acquired by Edible Garden AG Incorporated, having signed a letter of intent to enter a share purchase agreement.
In the US, animal-free component producer Nexture Bio has acquiredMatrix Food Technologies, which makes plant-based, edible nanofibre scaffolds and microbeads for cultivated meat.
Courtesy: Tender Food
Boston-based Tender Food‘s co-founder Christophe Chantre has announced that he stepped down from his role as CEO last fall.
Tender Food also received $5.1M as part of the US Department of Energy‘s Technologies for Industrial Emissions Reduction Development (TIEReD) Program, while fellow Boston company Ginkgo Bioworks earned $2.4M.
Superlatus, the parent company of The Urgent Company, has been sued by Eat Well Investment Group, which has accused the former of fraudulently selling its plant-based food tech platform to avoid contractual obligations and cheating it out of $10M.
Research and policy developments
In the UK, the House of Lords has recognised cultivated meat as a key engineering biology opportunity and is calling for improved regulation of these products in a report published by its Science and Technology Committee.
Vegan seafood startup BettaF!sh and upcycled apricot kernel company Kern Tec have each won a €5,000 award as part of EIT Food’s Marketed Innovation Prize.
Courtesy: Kern Tec
The University of Galway in Ireland has introduced a 12-week course on Animal Law for undergraduate law students, which starts this month.
In their attempt to bring vegan cheese closer to what consumers expect, researchers from the University of Guelph and Canadian Light Source have found that blending coconut oil with pea protein provides better melting and stretching, and mixing it with sunflowerr oil lowers the saturated fat content without compromising functionality.
Finally, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors has approved a motion to ramp up the procurement of plant-based foods to lower emissions and improve public health, with county food services now encouraged to adopt a 2:1 ratio of plant- to animal-based mains.
German startup Project Eaden has secured €15M ($15.6M) in a Series A funding round to launch its fibre-spun whole-cut in retail, starting with REWE supermarkets nationwide.
Using textile technology to modernise and futureproof the $35B ham market, Berlin-based Project Eaden has raised €15M ($15.6M) in an oversubscribed Series A fundraiser.
The startup, which makes whole-cut plant-based meat with fibre-spinning tech, secured lead investors Planet A Ventures and REWE Group, with support from DeepTech & Climate Fonds, Happiness Capital, AgriFoodTech Venture Alliance, and existing backers Creandum and FoodLabs. This takes Project Eaden’s total funding to date to €27M ($28M), just three years since being established.
Christoph Gras, General Partner of Planet A, said: “Research suggests that plant-based products could replace 11–22% of global meat consumption by 2035—but only if improvements are made in taste and texture. Project Eaden is leading this shift with its new fiber technology, which delivers a meat alternative that will appeal even to the most skeptical consumers. This first-of-a-kind approach is a crucial step toward decarbonizing the food sector.”
The fresh capital will support scale-up efforts and a European retail launch. Its ham products will debut at 3,800 REWE supermarkets across Germany in early 2025, providing an alternative to the country’s favourite meat (pork). The company will follow this with entry into several other EU markets by the middle of the year.
According to the company, the retailer was won over by Eaden’s ultra-realistic texture and taste. “Project Eaden is setting a new standard in alternative meat by delivering the meat-like experience that today’s consumers crave. As a launch partner, we’re excited to bring their innovative products to our stores,” said Hans-Jürgen Moog, chief procurement officer of REWE Group.
Modern meat inspired by the textile industry
Courtesy: Project Eaden
Founded by Dr David Schmelzeisen, Jan Wilmking and Hubertus Bessau in 2022, Project Eaden went viral on the internet when it unveiled its whole-muscle steak and placed it next to conventional beef, with online commentators wondering if the image was doctored.
The Berlin-based company has since expanded its portfolio to create whole-cut sausages, pork loin and, of course, ham. These meat alternatives are derived from an age-old fibre-spinning technology employed by the textile industry. This allows Project Eaden to meet technical requirements like elasticity, water-binding ability and strength to closely mimic animal muscle fibres.
To get here, plant proteins are bundled into strands, and then unfolded in a solution to create a homogenous liquid. This is spun to form ultra-thin fibres, which get integrated into a compound to replicate the collagen-based connective tissues found in animals.
Wilmking, the firm’s managing director, has previously explained that the tech uses two types of fibres. “First, we use strong and thin fibres for connective tissue, which don’t stick together much, but help make the meat structure and bite experience feel real,” he told Green Queen in July.
“Then, a large part of our product is made from a cheaper, juicier fibre that sticks together just enough to hold meat juice in small spaces, making it taste tender and yummy, like real meat,” he added.
Project Eaden’s ultra-realistic Serrano ham. Courtesy: Project Eaden
The resulting products have been endorsed by butchers, Michelin-starred chefs, and retail buyers. “Our proprietary tech is versatile across meat types, cheap and highly scalable,” said Schmelzeisen, who has a PhD in textile engineering and is also a managing director at the company.
The funding round comes at a challenging time for alternative protein startups, which have suffered from a lack of investor interest. Financing for plant-based companies fell by 24% in 2023, reaching $908M. The fall was even sharper in the first nine months of 2024, when the sector raised a mere $194M.
That said, investors have shown they’re willing to back challenger brands with well-executed products in niche, underserved categories. Paris-based La Vie, for example, closed a €25M ($27.4M) round in October, while Spain’s Heura brought in €40M ($43M) – and both only launched their pork-free ham products in the last 18 monts.
Alongside Project Eaden, these brands also benefit from what is a relatively competition-free space, with only Prime Roots, Squeaky Bean and Quorn the other prominent players making vegan ham.
Germans turn away from meat amid health concerns
Source: Pig Progress
Much has been said about the slow sales of meat alternatives globally, but Germany has remained a high-performing outlier. It is the largest market for plant-based meat outside the US, and accounted for 46% of meat alternative sales in Europe’s biggest regions in 2023. These products witnessed a 6% hike in sales to reach €990M and entered over 37% of households.
At the same time, 46% of Germans are cutting back on meat, particularly pork, just as plant-based meat production rises and the new national dietary guidelines recommend a shift away from animal proteins and towards plant-based foods. This is being driven by younger cohorts like Gen Zers, who have been found to be more receptive to meat alternatives than older demographics.
Health is another key factor challenging pork consumption. Processed deli meats such as ham are often packed with nitrates, and the World Health Organization classifies such foods as Type 1 carcinogens. Eaden’s ham products are nitrate-free, as well as free of antibiotics and hormones.
Still, several barriers remain, chief among them palatability. More than 60% of Gen Z consumers in Germany are unsatisfied with the taste and texture of plant-based meat, a number that rises to 80% for Gen Xers and 88% for those aged 69 and above.
Wilmking believes Project Eaden’s whole cuts are solving that: “We are here to make the switch away from animal meat consumption a no-brainer. Our products deliver on taste, texture and nutrition.”
Tackling climate narratives
Courtesy: Project Eaden
The other issue is climate. Nearly two in five Germans think the country eats too much meat, and 30% want to increase their plant-based meat intake, though more than half don’t believe meat is a major problem for the climate – despite animal proteins being responsible for 57% of food system emissions (twice as high as plant-based foods).
Project Eaden hopes to change this narrative – each kg of its products reduces greenhouse gas emissions by up to 20kg of CO2e, cuts water use by as much as 56 cubic metres, and lowers land use by up to 20 sq m.
The company will now expand its team across sales, marketing, operations and engineering, and is also working on broadening its range to more cuts, including Serrano and cooked ham, bratwurst, bacon, chicken breast, pastrami, and beef and pork flank steaks.
Another startup making fibre-spun meat analogues is Massachusetts-based Tender Foods, which likens its production process to spinning cotton candy. The company has raised $23M since it launched in 2020, and its fried chicken and pork are on the menu at meat-free chain Clover Food Lab.
German discount retailer Lidl will increase the share of plant-based food sales by 20% across all 31 countries it operates in by the end of the decade, with support from the WWF.
Extending its reputation as a food sustainability pioneer, Lidl International has committed to increasing the proportion of plant-based proteins, fruits, vegetables, and whole grains sold by 20% by 2030.
The retailer is the first to announce such a strategy across all 31 countries it operates in. It supports the Germany-headquartered company’s Conscious Nutrition strategy to offer a food range in line with the Planetary Health Diet, and applies not just to its private-label lineup, but also third-party brands, and standard and promotional ranges.
It’s also an extension of Lidl’s five-year partnership with the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), which was established last summer and namechecked sustainable diets as one of the pillars. In October, the conservation organisation introduced a methodology to help retailers align their sales with their climate goals, a tool Lidl is using as part of this move.
Lidl centres food strategy around climate goals
Courtesy: Lidl GB
Lidl has been pushing to ramp up its sustainability efforts over the last year. It recently expanded its reduction targets for scope 3 emissions (which make up over 99% of its climate footprint) – it now aims to lower these by 35% over the next decade, and curb emissions from agriculture, forestry and land use by 42.4%.
Selling a greater amount of plant-based food to replace animal protein sales is the most effective way to do so, given that meat and dairy production alone makes up at least half of the retailer’s scope 3 emissions.
In 2023, the company – which owns the own-label Vemondo range – committed to doubling the share of its plant-based meat and dairy sales by 2030. And over the next year, it marginally increased the proportion of vegan meat sales from 11.1% to 11.8%, and non-dairy products from 6.1% to 6.6%.
Now, it’s vowed to grow plant-based sales by 20% from a 2023 baseline. “For years, we have been developing our product range with a focus on conscious nutrition,” said Stefan Haensel, senior VP of quality and sustainability at Lidl International.
“In the past, we have created a strong foundation for a Conscious Nutrition strategy, which we can now build on to pursue our new, ambitious goals for the future,” he added.
To achieve this goal, Lidl will monitor and report the ratio of animal and plant protein sources to add more sustainable and healthy plant-based sources to its offering. It will rely on the WWF’s methodology, which provides retailers with a stepwise approach to drive the protein transition.
The Swiss organisation has urged supermarkets to set clear targets to rebalance diets in favour of ‘planet-based’ nutrition, recommending targets to achieve a ratio of 60% plant protein sales, as well as an overall sales split of 74% in favour of plant-based foods.
Endorsing the Planetary Health Diet can help supermarkets lower emissions
Courtesy: WWF
“By prioritising plant-based options, Lidl demonstrates how retailers can drive food system transformation – key to tackling biodiversity and nature loss,” said Mariella Meyer, senior corporate sustainability manager at WWF Switzerland. “Leadership like this, paired with collaboration among experts and stakeholders, is essential to accelerating meaningful change for people and the planet.”
It has also lowered the prices of own-label plant-based meat and dairy to match their conventional counterparts (or even beat them on costs) in Germany, Denmark, Hungary, Austria, Belgium, and the Netherlands. Moreover, it has positioned these products next to conventional meat and dairy items on shelves as well, which has translated into sales success.
These initiatives carry a lot of weight when you consider the sheer size of Lidl’s operations. The retailer employs over 376,000 employees across 31 countries, and its parent company, the Schwarz Group, is the largest supermarket group outside the US, recording €167B in sales in 2023.
Its leadership comes at a critical time for the sector, which faces an uphill battle to reach its net-zero goals. But with animal proteins responsible for up to a fifth of global emissions, a shift towards more planet-friendly foods is a no-brainer for supermarkets.
It’s also what the Planetary Health Diet is all about. It suggests that meat and dairy should only make up 7% of people’s diets to safeguard public health and combat climate change. Experts have suggested that the diet could help cut agrifood emissions by a sixth globally, while other research puts that number at 29%.
“The Planetary Health Diet offers a solid model that provides actionable recommendations without categorically prohibiting anything,” noted Haensel.
WWF Switzerland’s Meyer also praised the supermarket’s commitment to this diet. Through their partnership, the two entities are not just looking to increase the uptake of sustainable eating patterns, but also create deforestation-free supply chains and reduce food waste.
Dr Michael Greger, founder of NutritionFacts.org and author of How Not to Die, spoke to the Good Food Institute about misinformation and the link between ultra-processed foods and plant-based meat.
Perhaps the most pertinent public debate around plant-based meat today concerns ultra-processing, a topic that has prompted a shift to more whole foods, pushing industry leaders to reformulate products and talk more about nutrition on-pack.
Ultra-processed food (UPF), a subset of the Nova classification, was never meant to be about health – it simply was a reference to how much processing a product has undergone. But the confluence of processing and ill health has strengthened over recent years, thanks to a host of studies.
It has dissuaded people from buying meat alternatives, with a 10,000-person survey from 2024 suggesting that more than half of Europeans avoid these products because they’re ultra-processed.
Nutrition experts have been fighting back, highlighting the distinction between food processing and human health, and reiterating the benefits of meat analogues – especially over their animal-derived counterparts.
NutritionFacts.org founder and How Not to Die author Dr Michael Greger, a leading health expert, is one of these voices. He plans to write a book dedicated to the subject, and hit back at the misinformation surrounding meat alternatives in the Good Food Institute’s latest Science of Alt-Protein seminar.
Here are 10 takeaways from the event.
1) UPF effects can be independent of dietary quality
Studies involving nearly 10 million people have linked greater exposure to UPFs to a higher risk of chronic health conditions and premature death. But this association was found after controlling for dietary quality, so it wasn’t just that people were eating “junkier diets”.
“At least some of the adverse consequences of ultra-processed foods may be independent of dietary quality. This could involve things like harmful additives, heat-induced contaminants or packaging chemicals,” said Greger.
2) Plant-based meats are the UPF exception
While there are several factors that could explain the connection between UPFs and ill health. Normally, when you compare ultra-processed products (like Kool-Aid or fruit candy) with the foods they were designed to replace (in this case, water or fruits), the former category tends to perform worse on the health scale.
“However, plant-based meats appear to be the exception – better in most ways compared to the foods they were designed to replace,” said Greger. He cited a 2024 systemic review of nine studies comparing plant-based with conventional meat, and found that the former scored better based on every nutrient scoring system tested. And a 10th study rated plant-based meat three times healthier than animal-derived meat.
Courtesy: Dr Michael Greger/GFI
3) Are additives like methylcellulose a concern?
There is growing evidence suggesting toxicity from several artificial food additives, like synthetic dyes and emulsifiers. One of the most commonly used additives in plant-based meat is methylcellulose, known for its binding, gelling and thermoreversible properties. It’s also often used in laxatives.
But while there has been some potential harm found with methylcellulose use in mice, this is at 10 times higher concentrations than what’s found in plant-based meat.
“Reassuringly, vegetarians who eat plant-based meat may actually have lower rates of irritable bowel syndrome than those who don’t consume plant-based meat, suggesting that at least from that standpoint, plant-based meat emulsifiers are not a problem,” said Greger.
4) The sodium comparisons are misleading
Despite plant-based meat having more fibre, lower saturated fat, zero cholesterol and oftentimes comparable protein levels, one area they face scrutiny over is the sodium content. “The most harmful additive currently in use is ironically the most traditional of all, and that’s salt. The number one dietary risk factor for death on planet Earth [is] excessive sodium consumption,” Greger noted.
One study found vegan burgers to have 10 times as much sodium as beef. “But that’s because they were comparing raw beef with pre-seasoned plant-based meats. Now, they could have compared [cooked] burgers to burgers, but intentionally excluded them from the study, skewing the results,” he explained.
When comparing like-for-like, the nutrition expert said the saltiest plant-based meatballs have been found to be lower in sodium than the least salty conventional meatballs.
Courtesy: Impossible Foods
5) Plant-based meat can provide GLP-1 boost
Nearly three-quarters of Americans over 20 are overweight or obese, which leads to a host of other life-threatening conditions. This has also given rise to GLP-1 agonist drugs like Ozempic, Wegovy and Mounjaro. Greger cited research showing that a plant-based burger boosts the GLP-1 receptor about 40% higher than a beef burger.
Additionally, even when people swap only a single serving of meat a day with vegan alternatives, they lose significantly more weight. This could be due to fewer branch-chain amino acids, which improves metabolic health, or because the resting metabolic rate in vegetarians has been found to be 20% higher than meat-eaters.
6) Meat analogues enhance diabetes management
Nearly 15% of American adults have diabetes (mostly type 2), while almost two in five American children and teenagers are prediabetic. Greger highlighted the potential of vegan meat products in reducing insulin resistance and managing blood glucose levels in diabetics.
A four-year interventional trial shows that diabetics who replaced animal protein with TVP – a processed meat alternative – find significant improvements in blood sugar. Swapping a single serving of red meat with TVP vastly enhanced insulin resistance, though resting blood glucose levels were only significantly better through a shift to whole soybeans.
In another study, pregnant women with gestational diabetes who swapped half their animal protein for TVP not only saw improvements in insulin resistance and blood sugar control, but also found newborn hospitalisations lowered by 85%.
Courtesy: LaylaBird/Getty Images
7) Plant-based meat is good for the gut
The GLP-1 boom has also put gut health in sharp focus, and meat alternatives can bring major benefits here. They can promote positive changes in the microbiome, helping feed beneficial gut microbes, for example, which produce anti-inflammatory short-chain fatty acids.
Replacing a few servings of meat a day with Quorn’s mycoprotein alternatives has been found to increase the abundance of good gut bacteria and reduce the amount of DNA damage caused by faecal matter.
“According to the latest data, about 85% of ground beef and turkey are contaminated with faecal bacteria at a retail level. And about half a chicken, and a third of pork,” said Greger. “But you don’t have to cook the crap out of plant-based meat because there shouldn’t be any crap to begin with.”
8) Vegan products can reduce healthcare costs
“These days, most of us are dying from diseases of excess, not deficiency,” Greger remarked. Too much salt, too much sugar, too much saturated fat, too many calories. “Higher intake of meat in general – red meat, white meat, processed, unprocessed – [is] also associated with increased risk of death from all causes put together,” he added.
“If people swapped out about 75% of their meat, up to 50,000 lives can be saved every year in high-income countries potentially saving billions of dollars of healthcare costs,” he continued.
9) On-pack labelling requirements can help plant-based food
It was only last week that the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) proposed the rollout of a front-of-pack label that scored the saturated fat, sodium and sugar content of a processed food product from low to high. Greger praised on-pack labelling strategies, drawing a parallel with how the fight against trans fats was won when the food industry was forced to list them on their ingredient labels.
He argued that these policies – unwelcome as they might be for many food producers – have forced their hand. They now “actually have to care about sodium”, for example. “It would be nice if companies were like: ‘Maybe we should care about sodium because we don’t like killing people,” Greger said, acknowledging that it’s not something shareholders will ask about.
But front-of-pack labelling means companies can’t “hide behind some health halo”, such as “plant-based” or “natural”.
10) Whole-food plant-based meat is the way to go
Asked what his dream meat alternative would be, Greger said this already existed in the form of plant proteins “made by Mother Nature”, like kidney beans. But he painted a bigger picture.
“Can we make something healthier than a kidney bean?” he said. The way you make something healthier than a lentil is to do something to it that makes people eat more lentils. “Add some potassium chloride to lentils – all of a sudden tastes better you’re eating more lentils,” Greger suggested.
This could be complemented with some healthy fat, like a nut butter, and added fibre – or at least a mechanism that strips less fibre away. “Just more whole healthy foods in people’s bodies would be ideal,” he said.
Singapore-based cellular agriculture pioneer Umami Bioworks has introduced its latest product, cultivated caviar, for high-end restaurants, retailers and consumers.
Joining the cultivated meat companies targeting premium markets, Umami Bioworks has a hybrid caviar alternative, made from a blend of cultured sturgeon cells and plant-based ingredients.
The Singaporean startup – one of the most well-known players in the cultivated seafood pace – is targeting Gen Z and millennials with its latest offering, who are driving the global demand for caviar, but at the same time also prioritise sustainability and ethical sourcing.
With the new innovation, Umami Bioworks is aiming to decarbonise one of the most highly sought-after foods. Also known as salted roe, caviar is acquired from slaughtered sturgeons and has always come at a high price, both ethically and environmentally. And overfishing has made sturgeons the most critically endangered species on Earth, according to the WWF, with 90% facing the threat.
“By combining cutting-edge science with a deep respect for oceanic heritage, we are offering connoisseurs an indulgence that delivers exceptional taste and texture without compromise,” said Mihir Pershad, founder and CEO of Umami Bioworks.
Why we need cultivated caviar
Courtesy: Alla Machutt/Getty Images
Research has linked caviar farming with a host of environmental detriments, such as natural habitat destruction, waste pollution, and biodiversity loss due to illegal overfishing. At the same time, high temperatures, water pollution, and rising sea levels are disrupting sturgeon populations, causing shifts in behaviour, reproduction, breeding cycles, and oxygen levels.
Still, it’s a $402M market, and its sales have been exploding thanks to TikTok. Gen Z influencers have driven the #CaviarTok trend, which has received millions of views, and contributed to the 74% hike in caviar sales since 2020. The market is set to further expand by 40%.
But given the environmental and ethical issues, this is unsustainable. As of 2024, 30% of people had been eating less seafood globally in the past two years, with nearly half (48%) concerned about overfishing and 35% worried about climate change impacts. Meanwhile, over 80% of people changed their dietary habits in this period, and 43% did so for sustainability reasons.
Umami Bioworks is aiming to cater to that demographic by addressing the sustainability and ethics debate, while offering an alternative to the currently strained supply chain. The firm is using its proprietary cultivated meat technology and blending it with certain plant-based to derive the indulgent taste and texture typical of conventional caviar.
The startup says it’s packed with omega-3 fatty acids, antioxidants, and essential micronutrients, and is geared towards high-end restaurants, chefs, and premium retailers.
“We’re thrilled to introduce a product that resonates with ethically conscious, younger consumers, who are reshaping the definition of luxury,” said product manager Gayathri Mani. “We will partner with leading brands and leverage Umami’s solution to develop a wide range of customised, culinary offerings for diverse applications.”
Premium products provide better margins for cultivated meat startups
Courtesy: CellMEAT
There are several companies working to create more planet- and wallet-friendly versions of caviar. Some – like Cavi-Art, Zeroe, and Cavinoir – are offering plant-based alternatives, made from seaweed, sodium alginate, or agar-agar.
And like Umami Bioworks, others are working on cultivated caviar. These include CellMeat (South Korea), Marinas Bio (California), and Caviar Biotec.
They’re among a growing crop of cultivated meat status focusing on high-end species, which offer better margins and a product closer to price parity than their conventional counterparts, compared to innovations like cultivated chicken or beef.
Speaking of which, Umami Bioworks has submitted regulatory dossiers in “major markets across America, Europe, and Asia”, Pershad told Green Queen last November. It’s also in active discussions with the UK’s Food Standards Agency, and working with a pet food company to bring cultivated fish treats for cats to the US this year.
Green Queen has contacted Umami Bioworks for further details will update the story once we hear back.
With hopes of a European launch growing, Californian plant-based meat leader Impossible Foods has had a patent for its heme protein reinstated in the EU.
Two years after the European Patent Office (EPO) revoked a key patent it granted to Impossible Foods, the decision has been overturned by the agency’s Board of Appeals.
A culmination of a protracted process that faced significant opposition, the patent concerned the plant-based company’s use of heme protein and flavour precursors in its flagship burger, which allow it to ‘bleed’, smell and taste like conventional beef.
The heme ingredient – derived from soy and genetically engineered yeast – has been at the centre of a legal dispute in its home country, where the Californian firm triumphed over a long-running legal battle with Motif Foodworks, taking over its heme business. The latter ceased operations soon after the case came to an end.
Why Impossible Foods’s EU patent was reinstated
Courtesy: Impossible Foods
The EU patent was first granted in 2017, covering a meat alternative compromising heme proteins and “at least two flavour precursor molecules”. Impossible Foods inserts the DNA from soy plants into a genetically engineered yeast strain called Komagataella phaffii to produce soy leghemoglobin via a process similar to how Belgian beer is brewed.
But it was challenged by a straw man (or anonymous) opponent a year later, which argued that the patent was invalid due to a lack of novelty or an inventive step (when an invention is not obvious to a person skilled in the field), and insufficient disclosure.
The EPO’s Opposition Division agreed that the patent was invalid for the latter reason. And while it believed that Impossible Foods’s heme protein was a novel invention, it lacked an inventive step.
In its decision on December 20, the Board of Appeals said it was “readily apparent” the case was complex. “The proprietor had to address numerous and increasingly expanded attacks raised by the opponent and third parties during the opposition proceedings. More than 100 documents were filed, most of them after the filing of the notice of opposition,” it stated.
The appeals body found that the requirement that the heme-containing protein be ‘isolated; was directly and unambiguously disclosed in the patent application, as were the combinations of three flavour precursors.
Impossible Foods had also communicated how the heme protein and flavour molecules give its plant-based analogues the taste and smell of meat during the cooking process, the Board of Appeals noted. It additionally found that the company had made sufficient disclosures about its invention, which it said contained an inventive step.
Impossible Burger inching closer to European plates
Courtesy: Impossible Foods
The EPO Board of Appeals’s decision ended a year of significant regulatory progress for Impossible Foods in Europe. The company already sells its beef in the US, Canada, Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore, the UAE, Australia, and New Zealand – but has faced several hurdles in the EU and the UK for its precision fermentation process.
But in June, the European Food Safety Authority’s (EFSA) food additives panel issued a positive safety assessment of LegH Prep, a liquid preparation containing the company’s soy leghemoglobin and other ingredients. This was provisional, as it was subject to an assessment from the regulator’s GMO panel.
That came months later in November, when the GMO body ruled that the ingredient was “safe for human consumption with regard to the effects of the genetic modification”. It ended a Clock Stop – a period when evaluation is officially stopped pending further information from the company – that had hampered the process since December 2021.
This then followed a 30-day consultation period, allowing the submission of purely scientific comments and questions to be addressed by the EFSA and the EU Commission. Following that, the Commission will draft approval decisions to be brought to the Standing Committee on Plants, Animals, Food and Feed, which will discuss and then vote on them.
“The agency’s comprehensive, scientific assessment of the safety of soy Leghemoglobin (heme) across two applications reinforces the overall quality and safety of our food, echoing similar approvals from regulators in the United States, Canada, Singapore, Australia, and New Zealand,” an Impossible Foods spokesperson told Green Queen in November.
They noted that the GMO approval was “an important step toward bringing Impossible products to Europe”, adding: “We’re excited to continue our work with EU decision-makers to bring Impossible Foods products to European consumers.”
Impossible Foods’s patent victory comes at a testy time for plant-based meat in Europe, where it has faced renewed attacks over the use of meat-related terms on product labels. But in a positive sign for the industry, the EU’s top court rejected the French government’s attempt to instate a labelling ban, a decision that is set to be finalised by France’s top court.
Indy Kaur, founder and CEO of Plant Futures Collective, tells us why ‘open omnivores’ – meat-eaters open to eating plant-based alternatives – will lead the future food revolution.
What segment of consumers will drive the vegan category forward?
Indy Kaur, founder and CEO of UK consultancy Plant Futures Collective, is betting on meat-eaters. That is, meat-eaters who are happy to try plant-based meats, a group she calls “open omnivores”. Kaur believes they are the future of flexitarianism and represent the largest addressable market for plant-based meat.
Open omnivores are stuck, and need more information – and there lies the opportunity for brands and their marketing strategies. Speaking of which, Kaur is working with industry figures to develop a checkoff programme that involves brands raising a collective fund that goes towards promotional campaigns for the entire industry.
We spoke to Kaur about open omnivores and the potential they bring to the plant-based market, whether Meat Free Mondays really work, and what a future food checkoff programme could entail.
This interview has been edited for clarity and concision.
Green Queen: How would you describe Plant Futures Collective and its work?
Indy Kaur: Plant Futures Collective is dedicated to addressing the critical challenges faced by businesses in the plant-based and alternative protein sectors. We prioritise the challenges that have the most impact on businesses and identify opportunities to get behind.
Currently, these challenges are too complex for any single brand or retailer to solve alone.
During my time working with Tesco – the UK’s largest retailer – there was only so much in our control. Ultimately, we face a consumer demand issue and it’s hard to create ‘demand’ in retail. A systems change approach is necessary; that is, all actors move together, in the same direction, at the same pace. There are no quick fixes of ‘silver bullets’, only one North Star we all must align on.
GQ: How would you define the ‘open omnivore’ consumers and their importance to the plant-based sector?
Courtesy: Plant Futures Collective
IK: Open omnivores are my favourite group because we have the ability to help them. This group can also be seen as the future of flexitarians.
Our 2021 research revealed a segment that is nearly twice the size of today’s flexitarians, making up around 30% of the population. It’s a huge opportunity and an incredibly important group. In the UK alone, this could bring in up to 16 million new people, based on the current adult population.
GQ: You mentioned you used the Smart Protein survey data to differentiate between the two types of omnivores. Can you give us more insight into what you found?
IK: Omnivores, those who primarily eat meat, make up the largest dietary group, around 70%. However, we’ve found that this isn’t a single, uniform group; it can be split. In 2021, we discovered that 55% of meat eaters are ‘closed omnivores’. These individuals are simply not interested in changing their eating habits, and they’re content with the status quo.
The real opportunity, however, lies with open omnivores – meat eaters who are open to trying plant-based foods, especially plant-based meat, and are actively seeking to reduce their meat consumption. What’s particularly exciting is that if someone is interested in reducing meat consumption, they are also more likely to reduce their dairy consumption, and vice versa.
This insight suggests that the plant-based meat and plant-based dairy categories complement each other, which is great news for both sectors. For the success of the entire category, it’s crucial that both are successful.
GQ: How is an open omnivore different from a flexitarian? Would you say the former is a precursor to the latter?
Courtesy: Plant Futures Collective
IK: It’s fascinating. The easiest way to understand it is this: flexitarians tend to believe more that consuming too much meat can be harmful to health and/or the environment. Whereas, closed omnivores believe more that “lots of meat” is nutritionally necessary and that a meal is not complete without meat.
Open omnivores are caught somewhere in between. They believe that meat is necessary but also recognise that too much meat can be harmful to health and/or the planet. They’re unsure which direction to take, and are essentially just a bit stuck and needing more information – though we’re still uncertain about exactly what they need (we’ll learn more about this in March after an insights study).
GQ: Do you believe these consumers exist in the EU as well as across the world?
IK: Absolutely! In 2024, I spent time in the EU, the US, and Australia presenting insights to businesses, and it’s incredible to see the consistency between these markets. At the core of it all is the fact that meat and dairy have been deeply embedded in cultures and social norms for generations.
As people across various regions become more aware of the health and environmental impacts of high meat and dairy consumption, we will see a greater shift and necessity towards plant-rich diets and foods.
GQ: Your insights suggest Meat Free Mondays can have commercial cut-through. Why do you believe campaigns like these work? How do they encourage consumers to gradually eat more plant-based food?
Courtesy: Plant Futures Collective
IK: In February 2024, businesses told us they wanted to get behind Meat Free Monday. We partnered with research agency Harris X and went on to uncover some fascinating insights, those taking part in Meat Free Monday are forming healthier eating habits throughout the week, such as eating more fruits and vegetables, trying new plant-based foods, and opting for more meat-free meals when eating out.
We also found those who are aware of Meat Free Monday, 50% take part regularly meaning if we can reach the 72% of the UK population who aren’t yet aware, we could potentially bring in over 20 million new people into the category.
GQ: Can you tell us more about the UK-centric Meat Free Monday experiment you’re planning this year?
IK: Over 30 businesses in the UK’s meat alternative sector are involved, including all major plant-based meat brands and many startups. A world first?!
We’re collaborating closely with Meat Free Monday, M&C Saatchi on the creative, Studio Biggie supporting, and System 1 on research to identify the most effective message to engage consumers. The launch is set for Spring 2025, with growing interest from international markets.
Courtesy: Plant Futures Collective
GQ: Could you walk us through the thinking behind the checkoff programme you’re working on and why it’s needed?
IK: In the UK, we don’t have a direct equivalent to the US’s ‘checkoff’ programmes, but we follow a similar model through the Agricultural and Horticultural Development Board (AHDB). Both systems operate as centralised marketing and research funds, funded by levies in the UK. The plant-based sector, however, doesn’t yet have this kind of infrastructure, which would be incredibly valuable.
Campaigns like the US’s famous ‘Got Milk?’ and the UK’s recent ‘We Eat Balanced’ are good examples of how centralised funds can be used effectively to support entire sectors and protect their reputations. These systems work, and the plant-based sector could benefit greatly from a similar approach. [Vegan Food Group and Veganuary co-founder] Matthew Glover has been a key enabler here, and I am excited to support and see how we can make this happen.
Courtesy: Plant Futures Collective
GQ: How would it work in terms of collaboration with companies? Who is involved?
IK: Collaboration is key, and for a checkoff programme to succeed, all partners must buy into the systems change approach -–moving together in the same direction and at the same pace. Partners also need to commit to the experiment: testing, learning, iterating, and investing modestly to ensure active engagement and the resources needed to get started.
In 2024, we ran four workshops in the UK, covering proteins, dairy alternatives, and whole-food and veg-led categories. Over 100 businesses and organisations, with more than 200 participants, were involved. The feedback has been broadly consistent and clear: there is a strong call for a category-wide campaign to drive trial and overall category penetration.
Our work with Meat Free Monday is a good example, and we’ll soon expand to include dairy alternatives and whole-food and veg-led categories.
GQ: How is the programme funded? What are your plans for the first campaign?
Courtesy: Plant Futures Collective
IK: The funding for this initial phase is set up as a pilot to get things off the ground, and it has been working well thanks to everyone’s contributions, along with a generous grant donation as seed funding and support from industry partners who share our vision.
We’ve already built the proof of concept. When an opportunity is presented, businesses will come together and take action, and large-scale, multi-stakeholder campaigns are possible.
Now, we need support to invest in a centralised marketing and research fund, a checkoff programme. This is a call to action. Businesses are operating on incredibly tight budgets, making it unrealistic to raise all the necessary funding in this way.
However, I have no doubt many will contribute and take an active role. We will need to seek funding from other sources, and I’m excited to support Matthew Glover in this effort.
Our weekly column rounds up the latest sustainable food innovation news. This week, Future Food Quick Bites covers Burger King Germany’s new vegan option, a cured root vegetable bagel at Deutsche Bahn, and the UK parliament’s cultivated meat research.
New products and launches
Burger King has released a new plant-based King Rib sandwich in Germany. The limited-edition menu item uses plant-based meat from The Vegetarian Butcher, which may be in the process of being sold by its parent company, Unilever.
Courtesy: Verrano
Also in Germany, national rail operator Deutsche Bahn is offering a bagel with cured, smoked rutabaga (or swede) from Verrano, which makes whole-food-based alternatives to meat. It’s available at its on-board restaurants and bistros.
German chemicals and ingredients specialist Brenntag has collaborated with Berlin-based biotech firm Cambrium to launch NovaColl, a skin-identical vegan collagen for the personal care industry in the UK and Ireland, France, Italy, and Iberia.
Fellow Berlin-based company BettaF!sh has linked up with Austrian supermarket chain Billa to introduce a co-branded vegan Tu-Nah Sandwich in the latter’s stores.
Courtesy: White Owl Group
In Hong Kong, White Owl Group has launched a joint location for its plant-forward F&B brands The Cakery and Maya Bakery at K11 Musea, with new menu additions including vegan pistachio croissants and cotton cake inspired by the famous Dubai chocolate.
Ikea has teamed up with UK plant-based meat leader THIS to put its vegan pork sausages on the menu for its £4.95 Veggie Sausage & Mash meal at 19 locations.
Courtesy: This/Ikea
Aussie startup Fascin8foods, which makes mushroom-based burgers, mince and meatballs under its Froom label, has released a 24-recipe cookbook for Veganuary.
Are you struggling to keep up with all the new launches and announcements for Veganuary 2025 in the US? Hear about them from the horse’s mouth.
Courtesy: Rebellyous Foods
Vegan chicken startup Rebellyous Foods has partnered with Great State Burger, a Pacific Northwest restaurant chain, for a new crispy chicken burger menu addition.
Company and finance updates
Rebellyous Foods has also raised $2.4M in an extension of its $9.4M Series B funding in 2023. It will use the fresh capital to expand sales of its new Mock 2 production platform.
Courtesy: Tribe
Across the Atlantic, UK plant-based energy bar brand Tribe has secured £2.4M ($2.9M) to support the launch of a new adaptogen-centric ‘Protein + Focus’ range.
The Grocer has uncovered that London-based vegan ready-meal startup Allplantsowed creditors £13M ($15.8M) when it fell into administration last year.
In yet another move linked to protein transition, discount retailer Lidl has become the first major supermarket to use The Vegetarian Society‘s Plant-Based Trademark, which will appear on its own-label Vemondo Plant! range.
Courtesy: Plantible Foods
Israeli minerals company ICL Food Specialties has announced a follow-on investment in duckweed protein player Plantible Foods‘s Series B round, which netted the startup $30M in November. The two firms launched a Rovitaris Binding Solution using the latter’s Rubi Protein in October.
Swedish energy and tech giant Alfa Laval is building a Food Innovation Centre in Copenhagen, Denmark to support sustainable food production. It’s scheduled to be completed in 2027, and will initially focus on proteins, including plant-based and fermentation-derived ingredients.
European fermentation association Food Fermentation Europe has appointed Sebastien Louvion – chief regulatory officer at animal-free casein startup Standing Ovation – as its new president.
Israeli molecular farming startup Plantopia has switched from lettuce to sprouted oats to produce casein protein for animal-free dairy products.
Research and policy developments
Latin America now has 22% more vegan-friendly restaurants than it did in 2023, numbering over 10,000, according to research by Veganuary and HappyCow.
The number of care home residents in the UK who are vegan or vegetarian will continue to rise over the next five years, doubling by 2031, according to a study by Swansea University’s OMNIPlaNT research group for Vegetarian For Life.
Courtesy: Ivy Farm Technologies
In its latest move to advance novel foods, the British parliament has commissioned a new research project to consider the opportunities and challenges of cultivated meat production. It’s expected to be published in May.
Speaking of cultivated meat research, this was a hot topic in 2024, and Trove Biosciences founder Tarika Vijayaraghavan has laid out five takeaways after closely monitoring this space.
Courtesy: Hebrew University of Jerusalem
At the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, engineers have devised a way to leverage metamaterials to create whole cuts of plant-based meat that offer a more scalable and cost-effective solution to 3D printing.
Researchers at the Beijing Institute of Technology have developed a method to use autoclaved vegetables as scaffolds for muscle and adipose cell growth for cultivated meat.
The Good Food Institute has selected 14 researchers for its 2025 Research Grant Programme to accelerate alternative protein innovation.
Courtesy: Omni
Finally, plant-based granola maker Bio&Me and vegan pet food startup Omni have been named in the UK’s 2025 Startups 100 Index.
UK flag carrier British Airways will offer passengers free oat milk in Oatly’s jigger format onboard its short-haul and EuroFlyer flights.
Plant-based giant Oatly has announced its first partnership of 2025 – and it’s a big one.
Months after it first brought its 20ml format to market, the Swedish company is heading to the skies, landing on the menu at British Airways.
The airline will offer Oatly’s jigger on all short-haul flights, as well as its EuroFlyer fleet. The prism-shaped barista oat milk will be available to passengers as a free swap for dairy, an Oatly spokesperson confirmed to Green Queen.
Courtesy: Emma Jones/LinkedIn
Pyramid-shaped oat milks take over trains and hotels
Oatly first announced its smallest format when presenting its 2023 earnings report last February, as part of an expansion of its barista milk lineup.
The firm positioned it as a single-portion oat milk for on-the-go coffee connoisseurs on flights, trains and cafés, naming it after the cocktail measuring tool. The Oatly jigger made its debut with Swiss national rail company SBB, where it was available at all onboard dining carriages for no extra charge, and through British foodservice distributors Brakes and Bidfood.
It was one of four new barista milk formats launched in the UK last year, alongside the Lighter Taste edition for light-roasted coffee, the larger 1.5-litre carton, and a 500ml version.
“Oatly has been focussed on expanding the Barista family over the last few years, bringing a number of new innovations and formats into market that offer convenience to both buyer and supplier,” an Oatly spokesperson tells Green Queen.
“Our adorable Oatly Barista Edition jiggers are designed for on-the-go coffee connoisseurs. These pocket-sized 20ml pyramids of oat drink are for those who like their coffee or tea – wherever they might find themselves – with something other than cow’s milk,” they add.
Apart from British Airways, the jiggers can now be found in hotels and trains like LNER and Avanti West Coast, which are using the barista oat milk in both first and standard class.
Courtesy: Oatly
Oatly talks packaging waste with jiggers
This isn’t British Airways’s first foray into non-dairy milk. Last February, it began offering fellow UK company Glebe Farm’s PureOaty barista milk in hot drinks on all long-haul flights departing from London Heathrow and Gatwick.
That partnership is ongoing and unaffected by the Oatly deal, which is exclusive to short-distance and Euroflyer journeys.
These efforts come as British Airways – like the overall aviation sector – faces scrutiny over its emission reduction plans and net-zero goal (slated for 2050), particularly through the promotion of sustainable aviation fuels. While still lower than pre-pandemic levels, its scope 3 emissions (which account for the entire supply chain) doubled between 2021 and 2023.
There’s no mention of planet-friendly foods in its net-zero strategy – although the carrier does have measures in place to reduce food waste. But even something as simple as offering to swap dairy for oat milk without an added cost will make a difference to its emissions. Research suggests that Oatly’s barista version generates up to 76% fewer emissions than cow’s milk.
However, no analysis has yet been done specifically for Oatly’s jiggers, which have a much higher packaging-to-product ratio. But its spokesperson argues that this format is “used selectively and can actually help to avoid waste”. For example, larger cartons could actually result in product waste on airplanes, so the 20ml packs are useful here.
“Typically, our Oatly jiggers are being used as an alternative to cow’s milk supplied in the same format, and our product has a significantly lower climate impact than typical cow’s milk,” the representative adds. “90% of our packaging is sourced from renewable or recycled packaging.”
A major survey by The Vegan Society shows that 3% of people in the UK now follow a plant-forward diet, and one in 10 are cutting back on meat and dairy.
As the British government gears up to become a policy and research leader in the alternative protein space, its public is seemingly embracing these future-facing foods too.
According to a 10,200-person survey conducted by Ipsos Mori for The Vegan Society, 1% of Brits say they follow a vegan diet, while another 2% eat in a plant-forward manner (with only occasional instances of meat or dairy consumption).
Collectively, this represents around two million Brits. On top of that, 4% of respondents identify as vegetarians, and 3% as pescetarians, meaning that one in 10 consumers are either cutting back their meat intake or have eliminated it altogether.
Women, youngsters, and Londoners lead the way
Courtesy: The Vegan Society
Contrary to other research pinpointing the taste and health aspects as the major drivers of plant-based consumption, The Vegan Society’s poll reveals that animal welfare is the leading factor behind UK consumers choosing to go vegan, with 57% identifying it as a primary motivator. This was followed closely by concerns around health (52%) and the environment (48%).
But some trends align with previously published research, with younger generations – particularly those aged 16-44 – driving the shift towards plant-forward eating. These Brits are twice as likely as older generations to embrace such diets, as are women (3.6% of whom identify as plant-forward) versus men (1.98%).
Unsurprisingly, London has the highest share of people following plant-rich diets (4%), alongside Northeast and Southwest England. Scotland, Wales and the East Midlands, however, have the lowest rates of meat-free consumers (2%).
“These results reveal a remarkable transformation in attitudes toward veganism and plant-based living across Britain,” said Claire Ogley, head of campaigns, policy and research at The Vegan Society.
“It’s inspiring to see younger generations leading the way, with a growing number of people adopting more sustainable and compassionate lifestyles for a variety of reasons, from health to the environment to animal welfare.”
It follows a survey by Finder.com last year, which suggested that the UK’s vegan population grew by 78% from 2023-24, reaching 2.5 million. In fact, a total of 6.4 million people said they intended to adopt a meat-free diet in 2024.
UK makes play for plant-based
Courtesy: GFI Europe
The survey was carried out between August and December 2024 and is being released to coincide with Veganuary, the month-long challenge where people attempt to adhere to a vegan diet for January. Last year’s campaign already broke participation records (with an estimated 25 million people signing up), and the organizers expect the 2025 edition to be even bigger.
The shift towards plant-forward eating is yet to be matched by companies’ balance sheets. Sales of vegan products fell by 2.8% in the UK between 2022 and 2023, with volumes dropping by 10% – although signs from early 2024 pointed to a slight rebound.
Meanwhile, UK policymakers are getting in on the act. The government has contributed £15M to a National Alternative Protein Innovation Centre, for example, to ramp up the R&D and commercialisation of novel foods, including plant- and fermentation-derived proteins.
The Plant-Based Food Alliance has called on Keir Starmer’s government to adopt several policies to make the food system more sustainable, including developing a national action plan for vegan food. Further, the Climate Change Committee has said meat and dairy consumption should be halved and replaced with plant proteins by 2050 to meet the UK’s climate goals.
Research shows that vegan diets can cut emissions, water pollution and land use by 75%, given that plant-based foods produce half as much greenhouse gases as meat and dairy. And even a 50% swap of the latter with vegan alternatives would bring double the climate benefits, halting deforestation and cutting farm and land use emissions by 12%.
Singapore’s parliament just passed a Food Safety and Security Bill to adapt the country’s agrifood systems to climate change and advance future foods.
Already a leader in the world of future food, Singapore is strengthening its food safety and security measures with a new bill to deal with a compounding supply chain and the effects of the climate crisis.
“Singapore has also faced various food supply challenges in recent years. The Covid-19 pandemic saw the impact of supply disruptions when we experienced the effects of lockdowns and restrictions on cross-border movements,” environment minister Grace Fu told the parliament before the bill was signed last week.
“Supply chain disruptions arising from many other factors – extreme weather events, disease outbreaks, and trade restrictions – also affected our food supply on several occasions. With climate change, rising biosecurity risks and geopolitical tensions, the risk of food disruptions is expected to increase,” she added.
Fu noted that the government’s policy measures have helped ride these storms, but these must be supported by laws to enable the Singapore Food Agency to ensure a safe and secure supply in the island nation.
One of the major themes of the new bill concerns defined foods, which include novel proteins like cultivated meat and precision-fermented foods. Singapore has repeatedly championed these foods as a way to enhance food security – it imports 90% of its food – and the latest bill formalises existing practices for products that require premarket approval.
How does Singapore define novel foods?
Courtesy: Eat Just
The new bill describes “defined foods” as those that comprise novel or genetically defined foods that haven’t received premarket approval, including insects.
Novel foods themselves have been described as those made from cellular agriculture and tissue culture derived from animals, plants, bacteria, yeast, fungi, algae, and other microbes, which have not been used “to a significant degree” as a food for at least the 20 years in or outside Singapore. This also applies to processes that haven’t been employed to produce food in this time period.
“The policy intention is to take into account the history of consumption of food anywhere in the world, when determining whether or not food is novel food,” reads the bill.
When parliamentary member and climate activist Louis Ng raised concerns about any subjectivity around the definition of novel foods, Koh Poh Koon, senior minister of state for environment and sustainability, responded: “Since 2019, SFA has put in place a novel food regulatory framework to ensure that only novel food which is safe for human consumption can be manufactured, imported, distributed, or sold in Singapore.”
He added: “When in doubt on whether a food or food ingredient is considered a novel food in the first place, companies should consult SFA to discuss the available evidence on the history of safe use that they have compiled.”
What does the bill say about regulatory approvals?
Courtesy: Vow Food
The Food Safety and Security Bill codifies the existing regulatory framework to make it easier for novel food companies to meet the SFA’s standards and commercialise their products.
In many countries, innovations like cultivated meat need pre-market approval to be made available for consumption. Singapore’s policies have been at the forefront here, and the new bill lays down exactly what the process entails.
Pre-market authorisations take into account public health and safety aspects, considering whether the food has any potential adverse effects on humans, its composition, structure, and production process, the source from which it’s derived, and the likely patterns and levels of consumption.
“The safety assessments should cover potential food safety risks such as toxicity, allergenicity, safety of the food production methods used, and dietary exposure arising from consumption,” said Koh.
While there’s no expiry date for a novel premarket approval, the bill notes that such authorisations can be cancelled if they’ve been obtained by fraudulent means, if companies don’t comply with the agreed conditions, or if there’s been a material change to how the food is made, packaged, and stored. The SFA can also scrap the approval if the country’s public interest requires it to.
What happens next?
Courtesy: Eat Just
The new bill is expected to streamline the regulatory pathway for novel food producers, giving them access to more detailed information about the framework and safety assessment processes.
The provisions under the bill will take effect in phases, with full implementation expected by 2028, allowing time for companies to transition. For defined foods, it will be enacted in the second half of this year.
The SFA, which has been publishing regular updates on safety assessment requirements on its website, will now publish information about approved novel foods too. “Companies can also consult SFA or sign up for the bi-monthly Novel Food Virtual Clinics to better understand SFA’s requirements,” said Koh.
“SFA will continue to ensure that sufficient clarity is provided to industry through direct engagements with novel food companies, as well as through the updating of guidance documents online,” he added.
Singapore was the first country to approve the sale of cultivated meat five years ago, giving the greenlight to California-based Eat Just’s Good Meat brand. Last summer, the cultivated chicken made its way into retail via Huber’s Butchery, marking another first.
The SFA followed that up with an approval for Australia’s Vow last year, whose cultivated quail and foie gras are currently being sold at restaurants in the city.
Donald Trump is gearing up for his second term with all guns blazing, and it has left a lot of people nervous. That includes the food industry, which could be in for a massive overhaul under the Republican administration, thanks to a former Democrat.
Trump has nominated environmentalist-turned-vaccine-sceptic Robert F Kennedy Jr as his health secretary, potentially giving him free reign over the country’s food and health systems. While his appointment is yet to be confirmed, the political dynast could have a lasting impact on how America eats.
One industry facing severe uncertainty is cultivated meat, which has already been the centre of a culture war over the last year. Over a dozen states have attempted to ban these novel foods, and two have been successful – even as some Republican Congress members fear that the US is falling behind to China’s biotech dominance, like it did in the electric vehicle race.
Rumours are swirling that RFK Jr might follow the lead of state politicians and ban cultivated meat, but what has he really said about it?
What has RFK said about cultivated meat?
Kennedy’s public statements about cultivated meat haven’t actually come directly from his mouth. Instead, he has quoted and reposted several articles critical of these proteins from Children’s Health Defense, the anti-vaccine disinformation organisation he was chairman of until April 2023, when he took a leave of absence to run for president.
In October 2021, he shared a story that claimed cultivated meat was a money-making scheme for corporations and billionaires, quoting: “Lab-grown meat offers private corporations the opportunity to place intellectual property rights on meat development and thus create a financial windfall, at the expense of human health.”
Using strategies to position it as a healthy alternative for natural meat, the industry's fake meat is just another name for ultra-processed food, full of GE and pesticide-laden ingredients designed to look as much like meat as possible.https://t.co/iSr0ZiiFba
And in November 2022, he retweeted a piece titled ‘The Fake Meat Scam’, quoting the introduction: “Using strategies to position it as a healthy alternative for natural meat, the industry’s fake meat is just another name for ultra-processed food, full of GE and pesticide-laden ingredients designed to look as much like meat as possible.”
The same week, he reposted an article questioning the safety and climate benefits of cultivated meat, reiterating a quote that said “lab-grown meat is a pipe dream”.
More broadly, RFK Jr has been very vocal against ultra-processed foods, a category cultivated meat falls under. He has pledged to remove them from school lunches, and has had a long history of promoting regeneratively farmed crops.
Biotech + agribusiness giants are tapping into the “fake food” market in hope of profiting off consumers who are critical of industrial food production—but fake food doesn’t address root problems of industrial food + its eco + health consequences.https://t.co/u9FDIZDwxM
— Robert F. Kennedy Jr (@RobertKennedyJr) April 12, 2022
In April 2022, he tweeted that “fake food doesn’t address root problems of industrial food + its eco + health consequences” when resharing another article.
The same day, he said he “agreed” with the argument that governments should stop subsidising large food companies based on “dubious” and “misleading” claims. “Ultimately, we don’t just need to change products we’re eating – we need to change [sic] entire system,” the tweet read.
An uncertain future for cultivated meat in America
That last comment could be a marker of things to come. In the US, novel foods like cultivated meat are regulated by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Department of Agriculture (USDA), which in 2023 approved the sale of cultivated chicken products from Upside Foods and Eat Just-owned Good Meat.
RFK Jr tells MSNBC that he intends to clear out entire departments of the FDA pic.twitter.com/MKdt5MT0tB
But with Kennedy as health secretary, the FDA faces an uncertain future. He has vowed to clear out several departments (including nutrition) within the agency, and is weighing up a rewrite to its rules on food additives. That said, despite Trump seemingly promising RFK Jr the role of USDA chief, the president-elect went with Brooke Rollins instead.
Still, if confirmed, RFK Jr will work in an administration controlled by the Republican Party, which has spearheaded the efforts to ban cultivated meat in states over the last 12 months. Florida and Alabama have successfully done so, and lawmakers in Arizona, Illinois, Kentucky, Nebraska, Iowa, Michigan, New York, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas and West Virginia have introduced similar measures.
Is that a harbinger of a nationwide ban under Kennedy? That much seems unlikely, according to an ally close to the conspiracy theorist, as reported by the journalist Michael Grunwald last week. He was told that Kennedy will – as is expected – likely to make things much more complicated for startups pursuing FDA approval for cultivated meat.
Courtesy: Gage Skidmore/Flickr/CC
Already, cultivated meat has had a rough couple of years. Some startups have shut down, some have had to let go of staff, and many are financially strained. In 2022, VC funding for these startups fell by 75% to $226M – and while things seemed to be picking up again in the first half of 2023, Q3 saw only $3M plunged into this sector.
While there were some wins in the form of regulatory approvals, all of them were outside the US. That is likely to continue this year, and possibly for the next four. The US may be home to the largest number of cultivated meat innovators, but they face a great unknown.
Elin Roberts, co-founder and co-CEO of Better Nature Tempeh, believes the way people approach dietary change has shifted past vegan eating – and brands must too.
In 2023, Better Nature Tempeh introduced three marinated versions of its signature plant protein during Veganuary, positioning it as a fibre-packed food that can be counted as one of your five a day.
In 2024, it unveiled a smoky version of its tempeh to coincide with the campaign and cater to the demand for clean-label, unprocessed foods.
This year, though, the London-based brand is no longer talking about Veganuary, as co-founder and co-CEO Elin Roberts explained in an op-ed last week. But Better Nature is still pushing to reach Brits averse to ultra-processed foods (UPFs), a category most plant-based meat products fall into.
As a campaign, Veganuary has been instrumental in helping people steer their dietary decisions away from animal proteins. As Roberts pointed out, over three-quarters of UK consumers know about the month-long challenge, and 6% of the population have given it a go.
Courtesy: Better Nature Tempeh
There’s no questioning the immense impact of Veganuary – you only need to look at the plethora of brands and restaurants (vegan and otherwise) coming up with offerings to support the campaign every year. When you look at it that way, Better Nature is an outlier.
“The Veganuary message of going fully vegan for the month isn’t resonating as widely as it used to,” Roberts tells Green Queen. “The conversation is changing. Rather than cutting out meat completely or switching to alternatives, many people simply want to add more plant-based foods to their diets.”
She reiterates her support for what Veganuary stands for, but doesn’t believe that talking about it is the right approach for her firm. “Instead, our focus is on health, positioning tempeh as a better-for-you protein,” she says. And while being plant-based is part of the appeal, it’s no longer a “defining feature”.
The UPF debate has changed the game for plant-based
Courtesy: Better Nature Tempeh
The situation of plant-based meat in the UK is concerning. Government polling from 2024 shows that only 27% of Brits consume plant-based meat, and 44% never have. Here’s the kicker, though: 22% of respondents say they used to eat meat alternatives, but don’t anymore.
It’s a marker of the dissatisfaction around these products. A 2023 survey suggested that two in five Brits stop eating vegan meat products because of their taste, while another 20% do so for their price. At the same time, half of them were concerned that these foods are too processed. These apprehensions have translated into low sales, with volumes of meat-free products in the UK dropping by 9% in 2024.
UPFs make up 57% of an average person’s diet in the country, and up to 80% when it comes to children or people with lower incomes. And plant-based meat has suffered from a loss of confidence due to its classification as a UPF, driven by some very deceptive coverage by national media outlets.
Courtesy: Metro/The Telegraph/Daily Mail/New York Post
“Whilst it’s simply misleading to tarnish an entire category with one brush (plant-based is hugely varied, with different brands serving different needs: some for convenience, some for indulgence, and others for health), the impact is hard to deny: vegan products have lost their health halo,” Roberts says on the impact of the UPF discourse.
“People are also confused. There’s so much misinformation out there now – people don’t know what to believe. Is vegan food good or bad? There are many articles arguing both sides.
“We, of course, advocate that it is good, if – like any diet – it’s managed properly, but we also appreciate that nutrition can be complex. That’s why messaging that is focused on eating more plant-based whole foods is resonating better – you can’t go too far wrong there.”
Even the UK’s largest retailer, Tesco, is banking on this – its Christmas range was dominated by vegetables over meat alternatives, after data showed that “veg-led meals” account for 40% of its plant-based sales.
Tempeh: a plant-based healthier chicken alternative
So where is the conversation headed now? “People are less focused on vegan food vs non-vegan food,” says Roberts. “Instead, they’re looking for food that’s good for them, the planet and animals vs food that’s not.”
Research has already shown that people are less influenced by terms like ‘vegan’ or ‘plant-based’ – words such as ‘healthy’ and ‘sustainable’ on product labels are more favourable. “We believe the biggest opportunity to influence dietary change is to tap into the growing number of people who want to add more healthy and sustainable plant-based foods to their diets,” notes Roberts.
Courtesy: Better Nature Tempeh
“For a brand like ours, we want to reach as many people as possible – especially those eating meat. To do that, we’re positioning Better Nature as a healthier, ‘supercharged’ alternative to chicken. Not as the vegan alternative, though of course Better Nature being naturally plant-based is one of its credentials.”
If you follow the trends from the aforementioned 2023 poll, people want their meat replacement to taste like meat. How do you position tempeh in that landscape? “We don’t want to perfectly replicate chicken,” she says. “That would be impossible to do without the ingredients and processes that consumers are turning away from.
“However, we know two things. First, Chicken is the most widely eaten meat in the UK and second most widely eaten in the world. Second, tempeh – through its plain flavour, firm texture, absorption of flavours and high protein content – is an excellent swap for chicken in almost any dish, also offering consumers extra fibre, gut health benefits and plant points (as well as a shelf life that’s seven times longer). That’s why we call it supercharged protein, and chicken so-so protein.”
Courtesy: Better Nature Tempeh
Aside from taste, Brits also want their food to be cheaper, especially plant proteins. Chicken, however, is highly subsidised, despite being produced in the most inexpensive ways possible, often making it the most affordable animal protein. “Currently, we can’t compete price-wise with the cheapest chicken products; however, we’re cheaper than any added-value chicken products such as free-range or grass-fed,” says Roberts.
“Tempeh, made simply of fermented soybeans and water, is a naturally inexpensive food. It’s much cheaper than chicken in Indonesia, where it’s from, for example. Therefore, we know that we can get it as affordable (if not more affordable) than chicken, it will just take us some time as we grow – especially as we never compromise on product quality and our ethical/sustainable credentials.”
Better Nature targets German expansion and new use cases
While we’re comparing chicken with tempeh, another product comes into mind. In 2023, Roberts’s fellow co-founder Christopher Kong teased a prototype of a whole-cut chicken breast made from tempeh mycelium. He called it Tempeh 2.0 “Tempeh has been around for hundreds of years, so we’re not reinventing the wheel. We’re just giving it a serious makeover,” he told Green Queen at the time.
Roberts confirms that this novel product is still under development. “The earliest it will be launched is in 2026 because we need to take it from pilot production to mass production,” she reveals. “That said, we hope to start sharing samples of our Tempeh 2.0 with select members of the public sooner than that.”
Courtesy: Better Nature
She’s speaking to Green Queen after a stellar year for the business, when sales grew by 457% as it became the second-fastest growing meatless brand in the UK. It also doubled its distribution, launched into Asda and Ocado, and secured a spot on Tesco’s new Accelerator Programme.
For 2025, Better Nature company has some new products in the pipeline to appeal to a wider audience and expand the use cases for tempeh.
“We’re planning more above-the-line advertising to drive up brand awareness, and we’ll be pushing for supermarkets to replace plant-based aisles with protein aisles, where meat-free and meat will sit side by side, making it easier for shoppers to choose Better Nature over chicken and other animal proteins,” says Roberts.
“Our goal is to see mainstream adoption of Better Nature as a protein staple on a global level, starting with further retail expansion in the UK and Germany this year, before looking further afield.”
The Austrian government will launch a vegan and vegetarian culinary apprenticeship in July, months after championing plant-based foods in its dietary guidelines.
After nearly 18 months of negotiations between key stakeholders, Austria is finally set to kickstart a meat-free culinary apprenticeship programme later this year.
As part of Austria’s green economy plan, the Ministry of Labour and Economy (BMAW) has announced that the three-year training scheme will begin in July, aiming to equip people who want to work with future-facing foods with the skills to thrive in the gastronomy and catering sector.
It follows the publication of a draft regulation from Martin Kocher, the country’s labour minister, referring to the apprenticeship in June. Details are still being eked out for the Specialist in Vegetarian Cuisine, including whether it would be fully plant-based, but it marks an important step in Austria’s commitment to the protein transition.
A long effort designed to train the chefs of tomorrow
Courtesy: Kerstin Brueller/Vegan.at
Efforts to launch the apprenticeship were initiated by Joachim Ivany of the Green Economy, a parliamentary group in the Vienna Chamber of Commerce and Industry that describes itself as “the mouthpiece for entrepreneurs”. He was supported by the Vegan Society of Austria, and renowned local chefs like Siegfried Kröpfl and Jonathan Wittenbrink.
The idea of a ministerial decree for the apprenticeship was met with resistance from some quarters, including the Federal Vocational Training Advisory Board. But after more than a year of negotiations, Kocher published the draft regulations last summer, which was then followed by a four-week assessment phase.
A commission of experts was then set to decide the precise food names, recipes and examination documents used in the apprenticeship – but discussions stalled shortly after, leading to a petition signed by over 1,600 members of the public. This prompted the government to speed things up, finally signing the decree.
Ivany, who owns a vegetarian restaurant in Vienna, has previously suggested that more than a quarter of young Austrians recruited as skilled workers in the catering industry are now vegan or vegetarian. Adding to the argument for a training course, he pointed out how there were hundreds of restaurants across Austria that specialised in meat-free cuisine.
According to the BMAW, the apprenticeship will involve both regional and international dishes – think terrines, meat and fish analogues, basic sauce and their derivatives, dough-based items like strudels and shortcut pastry, and dumplings.
Participants will also be trained to master various cooking methods – from poaching and braising to pickling and smoking – manage inventory and orders, prepare service staff, and cater to allergies and intolerances.
“The introduction of the apprenticeship to become a specialist in vegetarian cuisine is a milestone – not only for the catering industry in general, but also for businesses that specialise in vegan or vegetarian cuisine,” Ivany said in July.
Austria digs deep into plant-based
Courtesy: Kerstin Brueller/Vegan.at
A survey by the University of Applied Sciences Wiener Neustadt found that among Austrians aged 30-39, nearly one in five (19%) are vegetarian, and 5% are vegan. This is much higher than those aged 50 and above, where meat-free eating patterns are only followed by 2-6% of people. The demand for plant-based meat is also significantly greater in younger age groups.
And a 2024 study by the Good Food Institute Europe revealed that 30% of Austrians want to increase their consumption of plant-based meat over the next two years.
“The catering industry is happy about every new apprenticeship that has the potential to inspire people to join the industry,” said Mario Pulker, chairman of the catering association in the federal economic chamber (WKO).
“The domestic catering industry is constantly changing and adapting to the current trends and needs of guests. Existing additional training courses with vegetarian-vegan teaching content are already well-received and in demand,” he added. “The new apprenticeship can help to strengthen this aspect even further and counteract the current shortage of skilled workers.”
An example of successful meatless apprenticeships comes from the Vegan Society of Austria, whose Vegucation programme has been training hundreds of students on plant-based products, marketing, and their health, climate and animal benefits for the last 12 years. The scheme has trained over 300 teachers who have gone on to become vegan chefs at nine of Austria’s 11 vocational schools.
“Every year, young people at 135 schools across Austria benefit from the plant-based content: in the 2023-24 school year, over 400 students successfully completed the Vegucation training and are proud owners of the ‘Vegan-Vegetarian Specialist’ certificate,” said Vegucation director Lisa Klein.
The new government-backed apprenticeship comes just months after the health ministry updated the national dietary guidelines, which now call for a shift away from animal-based foods. They’re based on a plate model, with 50% vegetables and fruits, 25% whole grains, and the rest protein – mostly from plants. Taking into consideration both health and environmental impacts, legumes and their products now have their own dedicated section.
Vegan meal startup Daily Harvest has launched a line of smoothies that pack 20g of plant protein per serving – and it’s tapped Sloane Stephens to help spread the message.
Already the owner of a vegan body care brand and following a plant-forward diet, US tennis star Sloane Stephens has partnered with ready meal maker Daily Harvest to promote its new high-protein smoothie range.
The New York-based vegan startup has rolled out ready-to-blend smoothies that pack 20g of protein from chickpeas and peas per 190g serving, and up to 10g of fibre. It plays onto the two most sought-after macronutrients in American diets at the moment, while also aiming to deliver on the demand for clean-label food products.
Available in dark chocolate, vanilla bean, and mixed berry flavours, the smoothies are available for $8.99 on Daily Harvest’s website, and can soon be found at Kroger and its subsidiaries, including Fry’s, Fred Meyer, Dillon’s, King Soopers, QFC, Ralphs and Smith’s.
Sloane Stephens: ‘Daily Harvest supports my peak performance’
Courtesy: Daily Harvest
The “nutrient-dense” smoothies contain whole-food ingredients like fruits and vegetables, dates and seeds, alongside vanilla bean and cocoa powders (depending on the flavour). The dark chocolate smoothie is being positioned as reminiscent of brownie batter, with the vanilla bean versions akin to classic milkshakes, and mixed berry evoking frozen yoghurt nostalgia. They also contain high levels of micronutrients like calcium, iron, and potassium, and are free from nuts and added sugars.
Buyers only need to empty the frozen contents into a blender, mix it with a liquid (like almond or oat milk), and whizz away. The idea is to pour the resulting smoothie back into the cup, minimising the need for additional cutlery – but at the same time, it does mean you need to wash your blender. And the product will likely not appeal to people who don’t have access to one.
One person it did allure is Stephens. The US Open winner says Daily Harvest’s meals and smoothies have become a go-to for maintaining peak performance, “whether I’m training, spending time with my family or running my business”. That business is Doc & Glo, which sells cruelty-free body lotions, scrubs, mists and deodorants.
Daily Harvest and Doc & Glo are working together to highlight their “commitment to supporting active lifestyles and overall wellbeing”, according to the announcement.
“As a professional athlete, I know the importance of fueling my body with clean, nourishing foods that can keep up with my demanding schedule,” said Stephens. “What I love most is how they make healthy eating effortless – just what I need to stay energised during my busy days.”
According to Daily Harvest, the new smoothie range is a response to one of its “most frequent” customer requests. “We’ve always prioritised engaging our loyal and highly engaged member base to help co-create and innovate across our portfolio,” said CEO Ricky Silver.
“As consumers continue to seek high-protein options to fuel their busy lives, no one wants to compromise on the need for real, wholesome ingredients,” he added. “Our new high-protein smoothies deliver on taste, satiety and nutrient density; no tradeoffs necessary.”
Can Daily Harvest attract Ozempic users?
Courtesy: Daily Harvest
In October, a report by 84.51° – the market research division of Kroger, where the new smoothies will debut – high-protein is the prized nutritional attribute in food products for consumers at its stores. Other major priorities include functional benefits and clean ingredients, both verticals that Daily Harvest is hitting on.
A 3,000-person survey last year also found that the two nutrients Americans are most interested in consuming are protein (71%) and fibre (64%), figures that increased from the poll’s 2023 edition.
The high-fibre content in the Protein Smoothie range will speak to consumers at a time when GLP-1 medications like Ozempic and Mounjaro are all the rage. More than one in eight Americans have already tried these injectable weight-loss drugs, which work by replicating a hormone found in our body.
That hormone – incretin – can also be regulated by dietary fibre. In the US, only 5% of adults meet the daily requirement of fibre intake, with the average consumption half this amount. At the same time, as of March 2024, 21% of US weight-loss drug users had been spending more on protein in the previous six months.
Meanwhile, over six in 10 Americans say they’d rather make a dietary change than take an injectable weight-loss drug if they wanted to lose weight. This has prompted food manufacturers – including giants like Nestlé and Conagra – to revamp their offerings and marketing to cater to those that use GLP-1 drugs, or are interested in doing so.
Daily Harvest itself began offering a GLP-1 companion collection of meals, with dishes like broccoli and white bean soup, dragonfruit and lychee smoothie, and bean and cabbage bowl. It was in response to “relatively slow” sales, Silver had said.
But he has indicated that the company won’t be aggressively pushing sales of these kits. “We definitely see it as an opportunity (but) not something we need to drastically pivot our focus toward,” he told Reuters in May. “Our food is already foundationally good for people taking these drugs.”
As for the protein smoothies, he hinted that there’s more of where that came from: “This launch is just the beginning – we’re excited to continue developing new protein-forward recipes that make it easier than ever for our customers to feed themselves and their families healthfully.”
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 host of launches for Veganuary, several plant-based brand campaigns, and a Bezos Earth Fund Ted Talk.
New products and launches
In time for Veganuary, Starbucks has brought its popular brown sugar oat milk format to the cortado, launching the espresso-based drink alongside a vegan Spicy Falafel Pocket.
Courtesy: Face Plant
With a menu designed by former Bon Appétit Test Kitchen star Molly Baz, Face Plant is an upcoming vegan fast-food drive-thru restaurant set to open later this month at a former McDonald’s location in Portland, Oregon.
Another Portland-based chain, ice cream maker Salt & Straw, has released five new dairy-free flavours for Veganuary, including coconut cake and pineapple jam, bananas foster with candied pecans, and chocolate caramel corn with candied peanuts. It’s also teamed up with pistachio milk brand Táche for vegan milkshakes.
Plant-based chain Next Level Burger is jumping on the superfood demand with a burger and smoothie shake available at all 10 locations for January, while its subsidiary Veggie Grill has debuted a five-strong range of superfood smoothies on its permanent menu across all 16 stores.
Courtesy: TiNDLE Foods/PLNT Burger
TiNDLE Foods has partnered with PLNT Burger, which will feature its vegan chicken on two burgers (in crispy and spicy variants) at all 13 locations on the East Coast.
Whole-cut meat maker Chunk Foods is continuing its US expansion through a listing with online retailer Vegan Essentials.
Los Angeles-based vegan protein shake maker Koia has extended its lineup with Koia Elite, which comes in vanilla and chocolate flavours and contains 32g of plant protein. The 12oz bottles are available in the chillers at Whole Foods, with shelf-stable versions set to come to 7-Eleven and e-commerce channels shortly.
In Germany, Rewe subsidiary Penny has launched Cremembert, a white-label Camembert alternative made from fermented cauliflower by Veganz Group, in its stores. It’s available for €1.99 per 125g pack.
Courtesy: James Moyle/Wagamama
In the UK, Wagamama – which is aiming to make half its menu plant-based by the end of the year – has partnered with vegan influencer Alfie Steiner (aka alfiecooks) to unveil a Firecracker Chick’n Ramen across the UK.
Bakery chain Greggs has reintroduced its Spicy Vegetable Curry Bake for Veganuary. It’s available nationwide for £2.10, and as part of its £3.35 savoury bake deal.
Fellow British chain Zizzi, which serves Italian cuisine, has teamed up with Bold Bean Co to put a Butter Bean Stufato on its menu for Veganuary.
Courtesy: Claudia Riccio Photography/Galaxy
Also in the UK, Mars has brought out a new flavour in its dairy-free Galaxy lineup in the UK. The vegan Hazelnut Praline chocolate bar can be found at Sainsbury’s for £3.
Plant protein producer Squeaky Bean has launched ham-like tofu slices in spinach-basil and tomato-red pepper flavours, as well as a Super Grain & Vegetable Burger (featuring fermented rye). The 80g slices are available for £2.50 and the burger for £3.50 per two-pack at Sainsbury’s.
In more tofu news from the UK, Cauldron Foods has come out with the “quickest-cooking tofu pieces ever”. The bite-sized cubes can be prepared in five minutes and are available for ¢2.75 per 160g pack at Asda.
Courtesy: Julienne Bruno
London-based vegan cheesemaker Julienne Bruno has annoucned the first product of its Collection 02. The Mozzafiore Pearls are its take on mozzarella balls, and will be available at Whole Foods stores in Kensington and Piccadilly from January 9 for £3.95.
UK dairy-free brand Nush has updated its almond yoghurt recipe to include more protein. The products now contain between 16g and 23g of protein per pot, and the move is complemented with the introduction of a new vanilla fudge flavour.
British vegan frozen foods makerOne Planet Pizza has gained a listing at 400 Asda stores for its recently launched Tex Mex Pizza.
Courtesy: La Vie/Papa Johns
And among the plethora of Veganuary innovations, one of the more outrageous ones comes from Papa Johns and vegan pork maker La Vie, which have worked together to roll out a Hawaiian Vegan Pizza for the chain in the UK.
Company and finance updates
La Vie, based in Paris, is also on the hunt for a new CFO to lead the startup’s financial planning, budgeting, forecasting, and fundraising efforts.
Vegan cheese giant Violife has rolled out a new National Quitter’s Day campaign to promote its dairy-free cream cheese across digital, social media, and out-of-home channels.
Courtesy: Violife
The Real Housewives of Atlanta star Phaedra Parks has teamed up with Danone-owned brand Silk to host a side-by-side live taste test of cereals with cow’s milk and its Vanilla Almondmilk. Held in New York City on January 9 (ahead of National Milk Day), contestants – those who prefer dairy over plant-based – will be hooked to a lie detector taste when asked which milk they prefer.
In yet another Veganuary campaign, UK plant-based meat maker THIS has debuted its latest TV ad with creative agency St Luke’s. The mockumentary-style spot features a real estate agent who was inspired to (unsuccessfully) become a wingsuit flyer after tasting its vegan pork sausages.
Nestlé-backed plant-based food startup Sundial Foods has also shut down, having sold its IP to “an acquirer with greater scale and resources than we have”.
Canadian cell ag platform Cult Food Science is now accepting cryptocurrency payments for its Noochies! line of vegan pet food. Customers can pay with currencies like bitcoin (BTC), ethereum (ETH), solana (SOL), and dogecoin (DOGE).
Courtesy: TreesPlease Games
British developer TreesPlease Games is running Veganuary promotions (including paid marketing) throughout the month on its Longleaf Valley mobile game. It’s expected to gain around 75 million impressions.
Californian plant-based giant Beyond Meat has released results from a life-cycle assessment that shows its vegan steak generates 84% fewer emissions than conventional pre-cooked steak tips, while requiring 93% less water, 88% less land, and 65% less non-renewable energy.
Policy and research developments
Andy Jarvis, director of Future of Food at the Bezos Earth Fund, has delivered a Ted Talk on the future of food, and the importance of using a “yes, and” approach.
Nearly half of American adults are looking to change their diets this year, but only 7% plan to eat plant-based, according to a survey by the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine and Morning Consult.
It’s also perhaps why the City of West Hollywood is urging people to participate in Veganuary, posting a list of meat-free restaurants in the city.
Courtesy: Heriot-Watt University
In the UK, NHS Scotland‘s Golden Jubilee University National Hospital has begun trialling biodegradable, plant-based theatre caps to cut single-use plastic waste. They were co-designed by the University of Strathclyde and Heriot-Watt University.
Finally, University of Exeter researchers are looking for 200 volunteers who are going vegan in January for a study about the impact of Veganuary.
US startup Meati Foods is facing a second lawsuit in less than a year for marketing its mycelium meat products as made from ‘mushroom root’.
Just a week after it settled a false advertising lawsuit in California, mycelium meat producer Meati was hit with another legal complaint over its ‘mushroom root’ claim in New York.
The class-action complaint was filed on December 23 in Kings County Superior Court by local resident Mario Burns, and accuses Meati of misleading consumers over the true contents of its vegan steaks and chicken cutlets.
The plaintiff argues that since Meati uses Neurospora crassa – a red mould that commonly grows on bread – as its base ingredient, advertising its products as ‘Made from Mushroom Root’ is a case of adulteration and misbranding.
“As the typical consumer is not a botanist, they should be forgiven for not knowing the differences between fungi and plants, especially in the 13 seconds taken to choose what to buy,” the complaint reads. “The mycelium used in the products, from Neurosporo crassa, cannot be used to create or grow mushrooms, and is not a mushroom.”
Consumers expect mushroom roots ‘to be from mushrooms’
Courtesy: Meati
Mycelium is a “bundle of fungi filaments” that underpins mushrooms, according to a blog post on Meati’s website. “Not all mycelia are the same. There are countless species and strains within the fungi kingdom. Some produce fruiting bodies, which we all know as mushrooms. Some produce mycotoxins to help them counter threats they might find in their environment. Meati’s mycelium does not make either,” the company says.
The complaint notes that Meati described ‘mushroom root’ as ‘mycelium’ in parentheses on the back of the packaging, which contained a label that read ‘95% Mushroom Root Protein’.
It cites a profile by Canary Media from June 2024, which explained Meati’s process as putting “a teaspoon of Neurospora crassa spores into a brewery-like tank and adds sugar for the fungi to eat”, to suggest that there may not be as much mycelium in Meati’s products as the company claims.
But the document doesn’t mention the rest of the article’s sentence, which reads: “The ensuing fermentation creates ’the protein equivalent of hundreds of bison’ in four to five days.” Essentially, the process of fermentation allows the microbes to reproduce and multiply rapidly, creating a fungal biomass with high levels of protein.
“Unlike traditional mushrooms, mycelium fibres are ‘harvested’ from the vats, they are assembled in an industrial factory, and pressed into the shapes of cutlets and steaks,” the complaint states, adding that when consumers see a front label that promotes a product as based on mushroom root, “they expect it to be from mushrooms, not a strain of mycelium grown in an industrial factory”.
“Mushrooms lack roots like plants,” it adds, describing mycelium as “the thread-like body of a fungus that grows underground”. It further alleges that consumers were “not informed” that the consumption of Neurosporo crassa “can cause serious allergic reactions, and other harmful effects”.
Meati accused of setting premium prices through false marketing claims
Courtesy: Meati
Burns says he purchased Meati products between November 2021-24 at stores in New York, and is looking to make it a class-action case, which would allow other state residents to join the complaint.
The plaintiff notes that the mycelium used to create Meati’s products has “little to no connection to mushrooms”, and points to the FDA’s recognition of the difference between the two ingredients. “Any food in which mushroom mycelium is used should be labelled to state that fact. Labelling should not suggest or imply that the food contains mushrooms,” the agency stated in 2018.
The complaint claims that the products are sold at a premium price (around $8.99 for 8.8oz) “as a result of the false and misleading representations and omissions”. The plaintiff suggests that he would not have paid such a high price had he known that the products were made from mycelium.
Meati, for its part, has removed most mentions of ‘mushroom root’ from its website, and has spoken of its shift towards marketing its products as mycelium “out of a spirit of simplicity and transparency”. Its packaging, however, still features ‘mushroom root’.
It was founded as Emergy in 2015 by Tyler Huggins and Justin Whiteley, and is one of the most well-funded meat alternative companies, having raised $365M to date, including a $100M Series C1 round in 2024. Its chicken cutlets and steaks are available in thousands of retail locations across the US.
The EU is banking on fermentation to fuel the protein transition through better-tasting, more nutritious vegan cheese and kefir products.
With vegan cheese the fastest-growing plant-based category in several European markets, the EU is investing millions into a project aimed at improving the taste, texture and nutritional value of non-dairy cheeses.
The Delicious initiative, coordinated by the Research Institutes of Sweden (Rise), brings together 17 entities from nine countries – from research centres and universities to SMEs and large companies – to create next-gen dairy alternatives.
We will focus on semi-hard cheeses like Gruyère, manchego, comté, etc. as there is a gap in this category regarding plant-based alternatives.
Max Boniface, co-founder and CTO, Väcka
Backed by a €5M investment from the EU’s Horizon Europe programme, the four-year project will blend plant-based raw materials with inputs derived from precision fermentation, yeast biomass and fibre-producing microbes to obtain the desired sensory properties without additives, artificial flavours, or ultra-processing.
“By integrating advanced technology with consumer insights, we aim to accelerate the shift towards plant-based diets and set a new standard for the plant-based dairy industry,” says project coordinator Charilaos Xiros, a senior researcher at Rise.
Cutting-edge tech will help develop better vegan cheese
Courtesy: Delicious/X
The Delicious programme convenes several fermentation startups focused on alternative proteins and fats, including Arbiom, Melt&Marble, and Väcka.
“We will focus on semi-hard cheeses (Gruyère, manchego, comté, etc.) as there is a gap in this category regarding plant-based alternatives,” Väcka co-founder and CEO Max Boniface tells Green Queen. “The idea is to be able to mimic the texture, behaviour and flavours of that category.”
When it comes to non-dairy cheese, he believes semi-hard and hard cheeses often lack the flavours and textures that could satisfy potential customers, and don’t melt the same way their conventional counterparts do. “Texture and elasticity are not hitting the expectations,” he says.
Indeed, 30% of Europeans aren’t familiar with fermented vegan cheese, according to a 2024 survey of over 7,800 people. And more than one in five who have tasted these products don’t consume them, highlighting a major gap in satisfaction.
Väcka, which has a suite of vegan cheese products made from fermented melon seed milk, will work with partners in the project to create sustainable production models for the fermentation sector. The entities will use cutting-edge technologies like data analysis through machine learning and bioinformatic tools to enhance the sensory properties of dairy alternatives and significantly lower product development costs.
Combined with high-throughput screening, they aim to identify the optimal blend of plant-based ingredients and fermentation processes to streamline the development of new products that are better for our health, tastebuds, wallets, as well as the planet.
“Delicious represents a step forward to accelerate the transition towards more sustainable diets and establish new standards for the plant-based dairy sector,” argues Xiros.
Delicious project to spawn many IP breakthroughs
Courtesy: Väcka
Through the initiative, the EU wants to reduce the climate impact of dairy production by at least 30% when compared to the existing conventional processes. Vegan alternatives can dramatically lower emissions – and this is key, considering that meat and dairy production accounts for 84% of the region’s agrifood emissions.
The EU already has goals to cut emissions by 55%, and farmer groups, agricultural lobbies, and climate organisations are jointly calling on policymakers to introduce a region-wide action plan for plant-based food by next year.
To accelerate the protein shift, Horizon Europe has simultaneously backed the Sustain-a-bite project, which is focused on developing whole-food plant-based meat from upcycled ingredients to tackle concerns around ultra-processed foods (UPFs).
But dairy remains the largest vegan category in Europe. Milk alternatives alone made up 41% of all plant-based sales in the continent’s top six markets in 2023, while yoghurt and cheese together accounted for another 14%. The latter saw retail sales grow by 7%, with volume up by 9%, per the Good Food Institute Europe.
“During the [Delicious] project, we will develop a dedicated AI model that will gather data both from precision and traditional fermentation,” Boniface says. “The matrix that will be used for the project will come from precise fermentation products, and also regular ones.”
He adds that the project is focused on scientific advancements. “There will be many IP [breakthroughs] and innovations coming out from here,” he explains. “It’s a bit soon to know if there will be a new jointly created brand but we, at Väcka, will be the first to take advantage of those innovations and apply them to our existing or new products.”
Singaporean food tech startup Prefer is adding cocoa-free chocolate to its beanless portfolio in an effort to fight the economic and planetary costs of the sweet delight.
Would you have a mocha made without the coffee and the chocolate if it tastes the same anyway?
Prefer, which is making planet-friendly alternatives to carbon-heavy food commodities, is betting on it. The Singapore-based startup made splashes last year with the market launch of its beanless coffee, which utilises waste bread, soy milk pulp, spent brewer’s grain, and fermentation to offer an alternative to your morning latte that won’t hurt the planet.
Coffee is one of the most carbon-emissive food items – in fact, its GHG impact is surpassed only by red meat, and dark chocolate.
There is already a glut of companies working on novel meats, whether plant-based, fermentation-derived or cultivated. But now, more and more startups are cropping up to tackle the cocoa industry.
Prefer has joined that list, with a cocoa-free chocolate prototype now in the works. While most details are under wraps here, co-founder and CEO Jake Berber says the firm is venturing into the cocoa world for the same reason that propelled its beanless coffee innovation.
“The price of cocoa is skyrocketing – we believe our solution solves a globally impactful problem,” he tells Green Queen.
Prefer gears up for B2B alt-chocolate launch
Courtesy: Green Queen
Berber is right. Cocoa prices shot up by three- to fourfold last year, reaching all-time highs. In New York, cocoa futures peaked at $12,931 per tonne in mid-December, following weather-induced low supplies for the fourth successive season in West Africa, which produces the majority of the world’s cocoa.
In fact, these hikes meant cocoa surpassed every other commodity in the value chain in 2024 (followed by coffee) – and prices are likely to stay high this year. Global cocoa stocks have dropped to their lowest levels in a decade, with Ivory Coast and Ghana – the two largest producers – the biggest victims of extreme weather, crop diseases, and reduced plantations in favour of illegal gold mining.
It makes more future-friendly alternatives paramount. Startups around the world are making use of agricultural sidestreams and more sustainable ingredients to make chocolate alternatives, or culturing cocoa cells in bioreactors to make bioidentical products like cocoa powder and butter.
Prefer’s chocolate belongs to the cocoa-free category, joining the likes of Voyage Foods, Planet A Foods, and Foreverland, to name a few. Berber isn’t disclosing how it’s made just yet, but he says it uses the same infrastructure and technology as its bean-free coffee – this uses byproducts from local companies, which are fed to microbes and converted into the same key aroma volatiles as coffee. The resulting products include ground coffee for espresso machines, cold brew concentrates, and ready-to-drink beverages.
“That’s always been the goal: to create a platform flavours technology that creates food and beverages under threat,” says Berber.
He reveals that the cocoa-free chocolate will be launched as a B2B ingredient for other food producers. “But we’ll be having some B2C pop-ups this year in Singapore,” he adds.
New facility and products in store for 2025
Courtesy: Jake Berber/LinkedIn
Climate change is already destroying the cocoa industry, acutely impacting those who depend on it for their livelihoods. If things continue to go the way they are, only two-thirds of cocoa trees will be left by 2050.
The industry is itself a major contributor to the crisis – a bar of chocolate requires 1,700 litres of water, and the need for land has meant that 94% and 80% of deforestation in Ghana and Ivory Coast, respectively, is ascribed to cocoa. The practice has led to the loss of over 85% of the latter’s forest cover since 1960.
While Prefer hasn’t conducted an impact assessment of its still-in-development alternative, Berber says other companies “should give a good estimate”. Take Voyage Foods, the fledgling sector’s most well-funded company, for example – an independent life-cycle assessment has found that its non-dairy milk chocolate produces 84% fewer emissions, while needing 99% less water.
So the climate argument is quite clear. But will consumers bite into cocoa-free chocolate? Berber believes that flavour and price are the two factors that will make or break these products: “For our target market – the masses – research shows that a delicious product at an affordable price point is most important.”
This is also what he believes separates Prefer’s chocolate from its competitors. “While we’re still prototyping, we’re optimising for taste and price. By leveraging our unique fermentation technology, the goal is to provide a product significantly below price parity while maintaining our partner chocolate company’s flavours.”
The R&D for the chocolate is being conducted at its lab in Nurasa’s Food Tech Innovation Centre, the same place it makes and packages its beanless coffee. The startup raised $2M in February last year to fund a larger-scale production plant, progress on which is “going according to plan”, according to Berber. “We’re planning to have our first commercial batch out of this facility in Q1,” he says.
Speaking of coffee, Prefer’s version has been “flying”, according to its CEO. “We’ve been sold out since we launched [last year] and have closed over 50 foodservice and HORECA customers,” he reveals.
Berber adds: “This quarter, we’ll launch a canned iced oat latte that will allow us to scale our B2B2C business via foodservice and HORECA.”
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 Octonuts California’s new cashew products, Gail’s new eco store, and Europe’s most vegan-friendly cities.
New products and launches
New York-based Bake Me Healthy, which makes allergen-free, plant-based baking products, has rolled out Soft-Baked Dark Chocolate Chip Cookies to its product lineup. Made from sunflower protein flour, it contains 8g of protein, 4g of fibre, and no added sugar.
Courtesy: Bake Me Healthy
On the west coast, plant-based snack manufacturer Octonuts California has debuted churro and strawberry cashew butters (priced at $11.99 per 16oz jar), as well as gochujang and crème brûlée cashew snacks ($6.99 per 5oz pouch).
Across the Atlantic, UK vegan snack brand ChicP has made its way into the pantries of British Airways Club Lounges, stocking a trio of hummus and breadsticks in harissa, basil and truffle flavours.
Courtesy: ChicP
Also in the UK, Tiba Tempeh will launch an XL pack of tempeh (featuring two 200g blocks) on Ocado at £4.85 in January. Meanwhile, its original block, soy-marinated, and curry-spiced pieces will be available in 1,000 Aldi from tomorrow.
Bakery chain Gail’s has announced it will open what it calls its first “sustainably built” store in London’s Southwark district at the end of this month.
Courtesy: OatMlk
And Indian oat milk brand OatMlk has landed a listing for its 200ml pack and its protein shake at 279 7-Eleven stores in Singapore.
Company, policy and research updates
In Israel, beverage manufacturer Priniv has earned approval from the Ministry of Health to employ BlueTree Technologies‘s sugar reduction technology on its natural juice line.
Courtesy: BlueTree Technologies
Catering company Accor Group Greater China has set a target to make half of the dishes at its hotel vegan or vegetarian by 2030.
Despite 13.5 million American households facing food insecurity, 29% of Americans aren’t familiar with the term, and 76% don’t believe it’s among the top three issues impacting households today, according to a survey by Sara Lee Bread and US Hunger.
Courtesy: Sara Lee Bread
In the UK, scientists at Aberystwyth University and Sun Bear Biofuture are working together to produce a more sustainable palm oil alternative through yeast fermentation for use in food and cosmetics.
Online booking travel platform Omio has analysed the number of restaurants on Tripadvisor to name the 10 most vegan-friendly cities in Europe. The winner? London.
Courtesy: Purezza
UK company BSF Enterprise (parent of cellular agriculture startup 3D Bio-Tissues) has listed 20 million new ordinary shares on the London Stock Exchange.
Finally, French agrifood firm Louis Dreyfus Co has signed a binding agreement to acquire BASF‘s Food and Health Performance Ingredients department in a bid to expand its plant-based ingredients business. The deal includes a production site, a state-of-the-art R&D centre, and three application labs.
It has been a big year for the future food sector. These are our editor’s picks of the 10 best stories on Green Queen in 2024 (in chronological order), featuring a public tasting for cultivated meat, an interview with a US senator, and Portugal’s plant-based strategy.
Beyond Meat unveils IV lineup
Plant-based giant Beyond Meat reformulated its flagship beef product line for the first time in three years. The meat analogues are now healthier, meatier, and costlier, and communications chief Shira Zackai explained why in an interview with Green Queen.
Courtesy: Vow
Vow CEO talks regulatory approval for cultivated quail
George Peppou, co-founder and CEO of Australian cultivated meat startup Vow, spoke to Green Queen about obtaining regulatory approval for its Forged cultured quail parfait in Singapore, and the company’s business philosophy.
Meatable hosts EU-first cultivated meat tasting
We exclusively reported on Dutch cultivated pork producer Meatable’s historic public tasting for its hybrid sausages in the Netherlands, a first for the European Union.
Courtesy: Starbucks
A trip to Starbucks’s Farmer Support Centers
Green Queen visited Starbucks’s Farmer Support Centers in North Sumatra, Indonesia to find out what the giant is doing to safeguard the future of coffee and the farmer community it employs.
Bezos Earth Fund talks alternative protein
After Green Queen revealed that Bezos Earth Fund’s third Center for Sustainable Protein will be in Asia (it opened in Singapore months later), its Future of Food director Andy Jarvis explained the organisation’s goals and the industry’s challenges in an in-depth interview.
Courtesy: Bezos Earth Fund/Rocío Lower
Alternative protein = EVs?
We contextualised a report by the Boston Consulting Group (BCG), the Good Food Institute (GFI), and Synthesis Capital that explored what the future food industry can learn from the rise of electric vehicles.
Massachusetts senator on highlighting alternative proteins in economic bill
While US states like Florida and Alabama moved to ban cultivated meat, Massachusetts passed an economic bill that pledged funding to alternative proteins. Senator Barry Finegold, who spearheaded the effort, spoke to Green Queen about the move and the importance of food tech.
Courtesy: UPSIDE Foods/Canva AI/Green Queen
Behind Upside Foods’s lawsuit against the Florida ban
Speaking of the Florida ban, California’s Upside Foods filed a lawsuit against the state, asking a federal court for an injunction and calling the effort unconstitutional. We broke down what the legal action meant, with insight from Upside Foods’s counsel. (A judge later rejected the request for an injunction).
India’s BioE3 policy and its implications for future food
Smart proteins, functional foods and climate-resilient agriculture were among the six pillars of India’s new biotechnology (BioE3) policy. Green Queen spoke to GFI India about how the policy came into existence, and what it meant for the alternative protein sector in India.
Courtesy: Venn Canteen
Portugal to develop plant-based strategy
We explored the behind-the-scenes moves that led to the Portuguese government’s decision to develop a national action plan for plant-based foods with detailed inputs from ProVeg Portugal director Joana Oliveria.
While investment in alternative protein and future food startups has fallen again this year, there have still been some sizeable VC funding rounds. These are the 10 biggest raises of 2024, featuring mycelium meat, animal-free milk, and cocoa-free chocolate.
1) Meati: $100M
Colorado-based startup Meati secured $100M in a Series C1 round led by Grosvenor Food & AgTech, the largest alternative protein investment since its own $150M Series C raise in 2022. It took Meati’s total funding to $365M, and was earmarked for its targeted retail expansion to 10,000 doors by the end of this year.
Courtesy: Perfect Day
2) Perfect Day: $90M
At the start of the year, Californian precision fermentation pioneer Perfect Day bagged $90M in a Series E round led by internal investors, simultaneously announcing the departure of co-founders Ryan Pandya and Perumal Gandhi. It took its total raised past $840M.
3) Formo: $61M
German fermentation player Formo closed a $61M Series B round, with participants including FoodLabs, The Nature Conservancy and Rewe Group, among others. It coincided with the retail launch of Formo’s koji-based cream cheese range, and brought its total investment to $117M.
4) Infinite Roots: $58M
Another mycelium protein maker, Hamburg-based Infinite Roots raised $58M in Series B financing Dr. Hans Riegel Holding (one of the two holding companies of Haribo), with participation from the European Innovation Council Fund and Rewe Group, among others. The round took the company’s total raised to $73M.
Courtesy: Infinite Roots
5) Prolific Machines: $55M
Californian biotech startup Prolific Machines nabbed $55M in a Series B1 round The Ki Tua Fund, the VC arm of New Zealand dairy giant Fonterra, with participation from Bill Gates’s Breakthrough Energy Ventures, among others. Taking its total funding to $86.5M, the investment was said to help commercialise its photomolecular platform to grow cultivated meat with light.
6) Voyage Foods: $52M
Also in California, ethical pantry startup Voyage Foods secured $52M in a Series A+ funding round led by Level One Fund and Horizons Ventures, which it said it would use to launch new products and support the construction of its 284,000 sq ft facility in Ohio (for which it later received a $25M loan from the USDA). The cocoa-free chocolate maker has cumulatively raised $94M to date.
Courtesy: Jayme Burrows/Voyage Foods
7) Helaina: $45M
To help launch its precision-fermented breast milk equivalent in the US market, Helaina closed a $45M Series B round led by Avidity Partners. The New York-based firm said the funding would help scale up its Effera Human Lactoferrin ingredient, bringing it to market in 2025 via products from Kroma Wellness, Mitsubishi International Food Ingredients, and more. It has secured $83M in financing to date.
8) Heura: $43M
Spanish plant-based meat Heura netted €40M ($43M at the time) in Series B financing, with investors including Upfield and the European Circular Bioeconomy Fund. The company said the funds would accelerate international expansion, allow it to license its tech, and drive the business profitability. It brought Heura’s total funding to about $95M.
Courtesy: Heura
9) Mosa Meat: $42.4M
The largest funding round for a cultivated meat company this year (and since 2022) came from the Netherlands, where Mosa Meat raised €40M ($42.4M). The oversubscribed round was led by Lowercarbon Capital and M Ventures, with participation from government-backed investors too. Mosa Meat has secured over $135M from investors, and is using the funds to scale up ahead of launch.
10) Onego Bio: $40M
Finnish precision fermentation firm Onego Bio raised $40M in Series A funding to commercialise its animal-free egg protein, Bioalbumen. The round was led by NordicNinja, with participation from EIT Food, Agronomics, and more. It brought the startup’s total funding to $56M, and was followed by Onego Bio self-determining GRAS (Generally Recognized as Safe) status in the US.
It has been a milestone year for the future food industry, with regulatory approvals, big partnerships, and major court rulings. These are (in chronological order) the 10 biggest wins for food tech in 2024.
Vow goes to market with cultured quail
Australian startup Vow became the year’s first company to receive regulatory approval for cultivated meat, launching a cultured quail in the form of Forged Parfait in Singapore. Months later, it secured the greenlight for its cultivated foie gras in Hong Kong, making it the only startup selling cultivated meat in two Asian markets. It followed Aleph Farms’s approval in Israel in December 2023.
Bezos Earth Fund sets up alternative protein hubs
Making good on its $100M future food promise, the Bezos Earth Fund opened the first of its three Centers for Sustainable Protein at North Carolina State University in May, followed by a hub at Imperial College London set up a month later, and a base at the National University of Singapore in September.
Quorn signs NHS deal for blended meat
Industry giant Quorn has had a turbulent two years, with sales dwindling and changes at the top. It desperately needed a win, and that came in the form of a partnership with the UK’s National Health Service. This will see Quorn supply its mycoprotein as an ingredient to be mixed with conventional beef and pork in blended burgers and sausages at hospitals across the UK.
Meatly is cleared to sell cultivated pet food
British startup Meatly became the first company to obtain approval to sell cultivated meat in Europe, and for pets. Its cultivated chicken was approved by regulators in the UK following an 18-month process, and was later part of successful feeding trials that demonstrated its safety and palatability for dogs. It aims to launch a dog treat product with a brand partner in Q1 2025.
Gourmey files for cultivated meat approval in the EU
France’s Gourmey, which is making a cultivated version of a local delicacy in foie gras, announced it had applied for approval in the European Union – a first for the region – alongside four other countries (Singapore, the US, the UK and Switzerland). It plans to offer its product to chefs and restaurants by 2026, and has already welcomed three Michelin-starred chefs to its advisory board.
UK opens national future food centre
In the UK, the University of Leeds became host to the National Alternative Protein Innovation Centre, set up by a £38M investment, £15M of which came from the national government. It will focus on plant-based, cultivated and fermentation-derived products and ingredients, and promote knowledge exchange via its international network of partners, which includes the United Nations.
Solar Foods earns US clearance for protein from air
Finnish food tech startup Solar Foods achieved self-determined GRAS (Generally Recognized as Safe) status in the US for Solein, its fermentation-derived protein derived from gases. The company needs to register its Vantaa-based Factory 01 with the FDA, and will seek the agency’s ‘no questions letter’ too. It suggested that products using the orange-yellow powder could be seen in the US in early 2025.
Gruppo Tonazzo says arriverderci to meat
One of Italy’s oldest meat manufacturers, Gruppo Tonazzo, decided to close its animal protein business after 136 years to solely focus on plant-based proteins via its well-established Kioene brand. The latter’s vegan burgers alone made up 63% of the group’s turnover last year, and given the environmental and health benefits, its owners felt the move was a no-brainer.
EU court blocks France’s ‘veggie burger’ ban
The European Court of Justice (ECJ) rejected France’s proposed ban on using meat-related terms to describe plant-based analogues, allowing producers to continue to use phrases like ‘veggie burger’, ‘plant-based sausage’ and ‘vegan bacon’ on product labels. The ECJ has returned the dispute to France’s highest court for a final decision.
All G gains China and US approvals for animal-free lactoferrin
Aussie precision fermentation player All G earned the regulatory nod to sell its recombinant bovine lactoferrin in China, shortly before obtaining self-determined GRAS status in the US for the animal-free ingredient. In both cases, additional steps are needed before it can be used in infant formula products – but a human lactoferrin equivalent launch is planned for late 2025.
Irish startup Nuritas has closed a $42M Series C investment round to scale up its AI-powered discovery platform for plant-based peptides.
In its bid to greenify the peptide industry and improve public health, Dublin-based biotech firm Nuritas has received fresh funding to the tune of $42M.
The oversubscribed Series C round was led by M&G Investments, with participation from McWin Capital Partners and current investors Grosvenor and ECBF. It takes Nuritas’s total funding above $117M, and follows a $45M Series B round three years ago.
The startup, whose early investors include Bono and The Edge from U2, will use the funds to scale up its artificial-intelligence-led (AI) Magnifier platform, through which it identifies and commercialises rare plant-based peptides faster than the industry standard. It further aims to expand its B2B client base, and reach a wider range of consumers across the globe.
“We are thrilled to welcome M&G’s Catalyst team and McWin Capital Partners, who share our vision of making healthier ingredients accessible to billions of people globally,” said Nuritas founder and CEO Nora Khaldi. “This investment, alongside the addition of experienced board members, will propel our mission to new heights.”
Nuritas to launch new peptide ingredients in 2025
Courtesy: Elio
Peptides are a class of short-chain amino acids that act as building blocks of proteins like collagen, keratin, and elastin. They provide a host of benefits to the body, including anti-ageing, anti-inflammatory, skin-repairing, and muscle-building properties.
These protein precursors can be sourced from both animals and plants, but despite their health benefits, most peptide ingredients today fail to meet the wellness demands of consumers, according to Nuritas. Moreover, developing new health-centric products can take decades and costs tens or even hundreds of millions.
The Irish company is hoping to change that by discovering new bioactive peptides in various plants, which can then be integrated into food products, supplements, cosmetics, and other functional offerings.
It claims to have built the world’s largest peptide knowledge base, and its Magnifier platform leverages proprietary data and genomics to identify peptides 10 to 50 times faster than traditional methods. It is said to have an “industry-leading clinical success rate” of over 80%, far higher than the industry standard of low single digits.
Nuritas’s flagship product, PeptiStrong, is derived from fava beans and supports recovery, improved strength, and muscle generation and repair. It received GRAS (Generally Recognized as Safe) status from the Food and Drug Administration in the US earlier this month, and is already part of consumer products across multiple continents, including its own Elio Restore brand.
It recently added PeptiYouth to its lineup, which reduces wrinkle depth and smoothes the skin by promoting collagen production. The ingredient is featured in skincare products in the US and Asia, and Nuritas plans to introduce three new clinically validated vegan peptide offerings in 2025.
Science-first approach wins over major clients
Courtesy: Nuritas
Having been around for a decade, Nuritas has some big names in its client list, from Nestlé and Mars to Givaudan and Sumitomo Corporation. And its peptide ingredients are present in products spanning pharmacies, retail outlets, online platforms, and specialty stores.
The company says its ingredients help partners increase their market penetration and differentiation with innovative, evidence-based products, as well as address consumer needs with solutions validated by clinical trials.
“Our mission is to improve the lives of billions by creating ingredients that address pressing global health challenges,” said Khaldi. “Through our science-first approach, we are fundamentally shifting the paradigm of ingredient discovery, enabling our customers to deliver healthier, differentiated products that meet the needs of today’s consumers.”
Martin Davalos, partner and head of food tech at McWin Capital Partners, added: “We are passionate about healthier, safer and more sustainable products and believe consumers worldwide should have the right to access these with ease – and Nuritas are at the forefront of developing technology and products to meet that need.”
Other startups working with vegan peptides include VeCollal, Geltor, and Active Concepts. Meanwhile, Croda Beauty is leveraging plant cell culture for its active ingredients, while Avant has rolled out skincare actives made from cultivated marine cells.
Meanwhile, Shiru is also using AI to discover plant-derived and microbial proteins, which it sells to corporate partners on its ProteinDiscovery.ai marketplace.
Meat analogue maker The Better Butchers has signed a letter of intent with Genuine Taste, a student-founded cultivated fat startup, to develop hybrid meat.
Ahead of its impending acquisition by Canadian cellular agriculture group Cult Food Science, Vancouver-based The Better Butchers is already making moves to advance its mission to produce future-friendly meat products.
The meat alternative firm has signed a letter of intent with Toronto startup Genuine Taste, which makes cultivated fat from animal cells, and will supply the ingredient to The Better Butchers for product development and sampling purposes.
The two entities will jointly create hybrid meat – a blend of cell-cultured ingredients with plant-based or fermentation-derived proteins – using the cultivated beef fat and The Better Butchers’s mycelium meat.
Genuine Taste working with ‘global food corporation’
Courtesy: Genuine Taste
The Better Butchers says it’s one of the first companies to get access to Genuine Taste’s cultivated fat, which closely mirrors the characteristics of conventional animal fat.
Genuine Taste was founded by biophysicist Pooya Mamaghani and University of Toronto civil engineering student Emily Farrar in 2022. To produce the beef fat, they take stem cells from a cow, which are differentiated into fat cells, combined with nutrients and salt, and left to multiply.
The fat can be produced at mass scale in bioreactors, and then be combined with other ingredients to produce meat alternatives that better match the taste, texture and functionality of conventional meat.
Currently, the startup is at benchtop scale. “I have… tasted it. I haven’t cooked with it, though, because it’s a very, very precious resource at the scale we are producing it,” Farrar said in an interview with her university in June.
She revealed that Genuine Taste has sent a sample to an academic team at the University of Guelph, which specialises in alternative fats, for third-party feedback. Additionally, it has sold its first sample to a “global food corporation”, which is testing the ingredient as part of a burger.
The startup has raised $175,000 from investors including Cycle Momentum, Startup Montreal, Big Idea Ventures, Antler, and Treefrog Accelerator. And just this month, it received C$100,000 ($69,500) after winning the Top Venture and People’s Choice Awards in the 2024 Invest Together in Climate Innovation programme.
The Better Butchers taps into hybrid meat opportunity
Courtesy: The Better Butchers
The Better Butchers says the cultivated fat will enhance the taste and texture of its product offerings, as well as maintain the functional properties of beef fat, such as its fatty acid profile, melting point and texture.
The partnership is among its efforts to collaborate with “cutting-edge companies” that use precision fermentation and cellular agriculture to create hybrid meat, alternative fats, and other premium ingredients. It aims to develop “high-end butcher-shop staples” like burgers, bacon and sausages, but with a fraction of the land, water and greenhouse gas emissions.
Its current lineup includes minced meat in natural, Italian and chorizo flavours – the latter won Product of the Year at BC Food & Beverage’s 2024 Rise Awards. It is also working with McMaster University in a four-year Genome Canada project to develop cultivated meat.
The Better Butchers was established by Celeste Trujillo and Mitchell Scott, who is also the CEO of Cult Food Science, which agreed to acquire the meat analogue maker earlier this month.
“I joined Cult for two main reasons. The breadth and strength of their portfolio companies and their focused investment in the cellular agriculture space. Along with their desire to acquire a majority position and build some of the first companies in the space to commercialize these exciting new technologies,” Scott said after the announcement.
“I believe this is a great opportunity for both companies to continue growing and delivering value to their shareholders,” he added.
To many, hybrid meats are the only way for cultivated meat to be commercially viable, given the current challenges with scalability and costs. Most cultivated meat products that have been launched into the market (or are being readied to) are a blend of cell-cultured and plant-based ingredients. Eat Just’s Good Meat chicken, the only such product available in retail, uses just 3% of cultivated cells, demonstrating the importance of hybrid applications.
