- FoodTech Weekly
- Posts
- FoodTech Weekly #113 by Daniel S. Ruben
FoodTech Weekly #113 by Daniel S. Ruben
News on FoodTech, food, and society
Daniel S. Ruben
September 09, 2022 • Estimated Reading Time: 13 minutes
FoodTech Weekly #113
Hi there,
Busy week! I pitched Stockeld Dreamery at the Norrsken Investor Day on Wednesday (literally stumbling onto stage like a big klutz, Jennifer Lawrence style). And a 30 min TV show on our founder Sorosh Tavakoli was finally aired yesterday Thursday; I spent a ton of time coordinating things for it when it was recording back in the spring of 2021 (the episode is available here, in Swedish, and yes, I'm in it too). Today Friday I'm in Helsinki for business, but I will not use a sauna in solidarity with the suffering local population (my flight CO2e here was offset via Trine; here's €10 if you want to try it out).
This week's rundown:
Misfit Market acquires competitor Imperfect Foods, consolidating U.S. food rescue market
Fur real: Bond Pet Foods raises $17.5M Series A to scale up production of precision fermented meat protein, turned into pet food
The Dutch city of Haarlem bans ads for meat
Let's go!
Conversations
Caught up with Tilen Travnik, Co-founder and CEO of plant-based steak-maker, Juicy Marbles (full disclosure: I'm an advisor to them). Tilen’s tech career began in high school; as an intern webmaster, he managed the official website of Bill Clinton's 1999 visit to Slovenia. 'I sat behind a computer all day, waiting for updates on Bill’s movements. Then I’d re-write the HTML in real-time.' (the site is still up, and feels authentically 1999). Tilen later studied Food Science & Biotech, but found his career prospects to be…less than bleeding-edge. 'I could be a junior researcher or a low-level food scientist at a bakery. Or, I could return to my old web agency as a project manager.' So, Tilen worked in IT for 10 years, founding two companies. But after going plant-based 6 years ago he felt he could contribute to the flourishing food startup ecosystem. There, he met his future co-founders, Luka, Maj, and Vladimir. 'We were united by a passion for fixing the food system, but with tech that had a quick route to market.' The team started with a plant-based burger, which flopped in Slovenia, but ultimately kick-started their mission to develop “the holy grail” of plant-based meat—the whole cut. Their patent-pending 'Meat-o-Matic 9000™ (true name!) is the first system to do this—without 3D printing or precision fermentation. And unlike most plant-based meats, the steaks are striated with muscle fibers and intramuscular fat (aka marbling), giving them a fork-tender texture. With this core tech, they founded Juicy Marbles in January 2021, hoping to displace some of the 60% of animal meat that’s consumed as whole-cuts, and were later accepted into Y Combinator (and launched one of the best Instagram pages out there). In the last year, they’ve expanded their facilities, raising another $4M to scale production. They’re about to launch both a Thick-Cut Filet and a Whole-cut Tenderloin in the European and U.S. markets and plan to apply their tech to other whole cuts in the future. Juicy Marbles are currently seeking more retail and food service partners (especially those interested in ordering directly) and are raising a $15M Series A. Tilen can be contacted via email ([email protected]) and LinkedIn.
The Slovenian boyband your mother warned you about: Tilen Travnik (top), Luka Sinček (right), Maj Hrovat (bottom), Vladimir Mićković (left). And the Juicy Marbles filet mignon.
Noteworthy
U.S. company Misfit Market, which sells surplus, ugly, mislabeled, and short-dated produce and groceries at a steep discount to consumers, will acquire competitor Imperfect Foods. Combined, the two companies will have about half a million members, and 3,000 employees. The transaxction brings total U.S. food wste investment to nearly $1B so far this year. When Misfit raised a Series C round last year (led by SoftBank's Vision Fund), the company was valued at $2B.
In related news, Oslo, Norway food waste prevention software startup TotalCtrl clinched $1.5M in new funding, and also secured an EU grant worth $0.7M.
Boulder, Colorado startup Bond Pet Foods has nabbed $17.5M in Series A funding; the company uses precision fermentation to cultivate meat proteins which are turned into pet food. The round will allow the company to scale up both its team and production.
Chicago-based autonomous tractor company Sabanto has secured a $17M Series A round from investors such as Fulcrum, Yara Growth Ventues, DCVC Bio, and Trimble Ventures. Sabanto helps retrofit existing manual tractors and agricultural machinery into autonomous vehicles, that can till, plant, seed, weed, mow, and more -- which saves on labor costs.
Cultivated Biosciences of Switzerland announced a $1.5M pre-seed round; the company uses a GMO-free yeast to produce a plant-based fat akin to that of animal dairy.
Source: Cultivated Biosciences
Forsea Foods of Israel announced it has developed a novel approach to grow animal cells in bioreactors and turn them into whole cuts and fillets. The first product will be freshwater eel.
Fascinating article in New Yorker about what refrigeration and cold chain can enable in Africa.
Scientists are trying to reverse food allergies with a microbiome breakthrough. Some 17M Europeans suffer from food allergies.
The Dutch city of Haarlem has become the first in the world to ban ads for meat, in an effort to discourage meat consumption.
Israeli FoodTech startup BioBetter has harvested $10M in Series A funding. The company is developing key growth factors (such as insulin, transferrin, and FGF2) needed for cultivating meat, in field-grown tobacco plants. For example, BioBetter may be able to bring the cost of FGF2 down from $50K per gram (0.03 oz), to just $1 per gram. This, in turn, may reduce the cost of cultivating meat by 3x.
Source: BioBetter / Alexander Seleznyov
Russia is systematically destroying the Ukrainian farm system.
This German farm is growing apple trees under solar panels. The panels provide the fruits below with much-needed shade. While the apples grown under solar panels are slighly less sweet than other apples, they are also not damaged by the scorching sunlight. Great photo story from AP.
Berlin-based AgTech startup Klim has landed a $6.6M Seed round. The company develops software tools that help farmers transition to regenerative agricultural practices, partly by providing them financial incentives.
The animal feed market size is expected to reach $125B by 2026, a new report says.
DigitalFoodLab has released its new report on the state of the European FoodTech ecosystem. While investments in the first half of 2022 are down 40% vs. H1 2021, investments are actually up 170% compared to H1 2020. In fact, FoodTech startups in Europe have raised more in the first half of 2022 compared to all of 2020.
Researchers led by a team at Lund University in Sweden have developed a cheaper process to manufacturing pheromones, slashing the cost from $1k-$3.5k per kilo to just $70-$125 per kilo. The pheromones can be used by farmers to confuse insects and inhibit reproduction. Over time, this may help cut pesticide use.
Revo Foods of Austria have launched several new products including plant-based tuna spread, salmon spread, and gravlax. In related news, plant-based seafood brand Good Catch's U.S. operations have been acquired by Wicked Kitchen. Good Catch had raised $77M in total.
Source: Revo Foods
News from the FoodTech Weekly community
petgood (Sweden) is hiring a Social Media & Content Creator... Colorado State University (U.S) is recruting a Research Scientist for the Periodic Table of Food Initiative... Kern Tec (Austria) is looking for a Marketing & Brand Manager... BIOMILQ (U.S) has open roles for a Senior Process Engineer and a Bioprocess Associate.
Brad Vanstone, Founder of alt cheese brand Willicroft, is not having it with the Dutch Food Standards Agency NVWA fining his company for using the word 'cheese' on their website and social. He's now building a coalition to help remove language bans that inhibite plant-based companies. Read more and reach out to him here.
The application form for the Food Innovation Summit's pitching competition is now open. Apply with your alt protein startup or idea here. Food Innovation Summit 2022 is the largest alt protein conference in the Baltics and Nordics and takes place on Oct 25 in Tallinn, Estonia.
Don't miss FoodTechIL, the largest Israeli FoodTech conference and startup expo. Use the code FoodTechWeekly10 for a 10% ticket discount.
Impact VC AENU has written a neat primer to alt protein, and also put together a cheat sheet for those in a hurry.
Want to share some FoodTech news/project with other FoodTech Weekly subscribers? Hit reply.
Random Stuff
The creepiest cooking video you'll ever see:
A G.O.A.T. cheese vending machine in Michigan.
Hats off to U.K. private citizen Liz Trussel, who is erroneously getting tagged by world leaders congratulating her on becoming the next U.K. Prime Minister, and patiently responding gracefully:
Sheep are now being used to clear weeds on tens of thousands of U.S. solar fields, paying their shepherds up to $500/acre annually.
I love you.
Daniel
- - -
This issue was produced while listening to Changes by 2Pac. Follow me on LinkedIn and Twitter. And here's the Appetizer which I co-host. Did your brilliant friend forward this to you? Subscribe here.