From a flurry of startups using microbes – instead of plants or animals – to produce proteins, to AI-driven platforms exploring ‘the dark matter of nutrition,’ and real honey produced without bees, check out our gallery of foodtech companies to watch in 2021.
First came real milk proteins without cows, then egg proteins without chickens, and collagen without animals … and now honey, minus the bees? MeliBio is biosynthesizing honey by replicating the multistep process that honey bees use to convert nectar into food.
The plan is to launch a branded ingredient that can be used by food and beverage companies rather than launching a CPG brand, says CEO Darko Mandich. “Several companies have already signed letters of intent and they want to purchase our honey as soon as it is available.”
Boston-based Conagen has come up with cost effective ways to produce key elements of human breastmilk, from iron-binding protein lactoferrin to a non-GMO version of the human milk oligosaccharide 2’FL - via microbial fermentation, paving the way for a new generation of infant formulas that more closely match the nutrition of breastmilk.
Picture: Gettyimages/stefanovicigor
Moolec Science has developed techniques enabling it to express animal proteins in plants (rather than microbes) on an industrial scale. The company - which is based in the UK but has global ambitions - is initially focusing on soy and pea crops to create unique blends of functional proteins found in pigs and cows.
EPG (brand name: Epogee) is a plant-based oil that has been restructured in such a way that virtually none of it is absorbed by the body (instead of the usual 9 calories per gram, this fat has 0.7). And it's attracting interest from formulators across the food industry, as firms see an opportunity to make significant calorie reductions without compromising on taste or texture, claims chief commercial officer Jayme Caruso.
Unlike Olestra (which had a lower melting point and messy side effects) or fat replacers made from sugars, gums, starches or fibers (which provide bulking, humectancy and mouthfeel but many firms don’t want to include on the ingredients list), EPG functions like fat in food products and in the human body because it’s made from fat, he says.
“EPG looks feels, tastes, and functions like fat because it’s made from fat, it just doesn’t deliver the calories.”
Brightseed – a San Francisco-based startup deploying artificial intelligence (AI) to analyze hundreds of thousands of phytonutrients for potential health benefits – was launched by three former Hampton Creek (Eat Just) executives in 2017 (Sofia Elizondo, Dr Lee Chae, and Dr Jim Flatt).
Working with partners from Danone to Pharmavite, Brightseed can either home in on a particular plant or can screen by compound, or by health benefit (e.g. LDL cholesterol reduction, metabolic health, cognitive function).
Once it has identified fruitful targets, it can then work with partners using more traditional analytical methods and clinical trials to validate its computational work, says Dr Flatt, who notes that Brightseed had demonstrated the potential of its platform by identifying a compound found in black peppercorns and several other plant sources that could deliver metabolic health benefits.
Key areas of research include digestive health, immune health, and cognitive function.
Making the next-generation of plant-based foods might not be rocket science, but it will take a hefty dose of data science, predicts the astrophysicist behind Climax Foods, a Berkeley-based startup on a mission to reverse engineer animal foods and re-build them from plants, piece by molecular piece, starting with cheese.
“We want to essentially replace cows and other animals as inefficient factories for converting plants into meat and dairy,” says Oliver Zahn, PhD (linkedin strapline: ‘Astrophysicist interested in making Earth a better place’), who recently raised $7.5m in seed capital.
The plan is to use machine learning (among other things) to model what happens when you combine certain proteins with certain fats with certain carbohydrates, and predict what the texture, smell, or functionality might be, experimenting with hundreds of thousands of small molecules, something that would take millennia to test for real, he says.
“It’s about innovating faster, using machine intelligence to simplify and speed up the formulation process, to optimize flavor, texture, nutrition and price, because right now, a lot of plant products are not better than animal products and in some cases they are actually worse.”
Change Foods – one of a new breed of startups making real dairy ingredients using microbes instead of cows – is setting up shop in California, with ambitions to launch its first consumer products (cheeses) in the US market in 2023.
The plan for the startup - which has just raised $875k in seed funding and hired Danone exec Irina Gerry as its CMO - is to “have test products for public consumption by the end of 2022, and then a retail launch some time in 2023,” says co-founder David Bucca, who says plant-based cheeses have gotten better over the years, but still don’t cut it when it comes to flavor and functionality.
“The nut- and legume-based products just don’t have the melt and stretch and mouthfeel of, say, American cheese you’d get in a burger.”
New Culture is also developing ‘real’ cheese with casein proteins made from microbial fermentation (instead of cow’s milk) that its founder claims can deliver taste, functionality and nutrition that plant-based cheeses simply cannot match.
Perfect Day dairy proteins (and in future fats) are cleaner, greener and kinder than those produced via industrialized animal farming, claim its founders, but they also represent a new supply of animal-free ingredients that deliver the unique functionality and nutrition of dairy so that formulators do not have to compromise.
Perfect Day’s animal-free whey proteins are now in several animal-free ice cream products from brands including Smitten Ice Cream, Graeter’s, and Brave Robot, the first brand to emerge from The Urgent Company – a spinoff from Perfect Day that’s focused on consumer brands.
A new player has emerged in the burgeoning alternative protein space touting a novel protein (‘Plentify’) sourced from a bacterium found in the human microbiome, which it claims can give traditional animal and plant proteins a run for their money.
Plantible Foods – a San Diego-based startup producing protein concentrates from lemna - a fast-growing aquatic plant that can be harvested all year round – is extracting the protein [an enzyme called RuBisCO] via a multi-step, easily scalable mechanical process to produce a complete protein (PDCAAS score 1) that has many of the nutritional and functional attributes of egg white and a neutral taste, odor and color.
“We are all growing a very similar crop but our end product is very different," say its co-founders.
“Our mission has always been to find a plant-based protein that can really replace animal protein from a nutritional and functional perspective, and that’s what RuBisCO is. It’s a complete protein but it’s also allergen-free, and can also create foams like meringues, and is identical to what you’re getting from an egg white.”
Santa Barbara-based Apeel makes an invisible plant-based edible skin proven to dramatically extend the shelf-life of fresh produce by keeping moisture in and oxygen out, reducing food waste and giving consumers more time to enjoy fruits and veggies at peak ripeness.
Clara Foods - which is producing egg proteins via microbial fermentation – is particularly excited about individual proteins in eggs with unique properties that had not previously been explored as it is too expensive to extract them from eggs, says CTO Dr Ranjan Patnaik.
“We’re able to produce specific proteins such as iron-carrying proteins, anti-microbial proteins, proteins with amazing nutritional properties and functionalities that will just wow you as a consumer.
“So for example, we’re working on the world’s most soluble protein. It’s amazing as proteins generally don’t dissolve… Our discovery pipeline has proteins that are amazing and we are unraveling new functionalities that can go into the entire culinary space in a very different way.”
A series C funding round is planned for early 2021 to accelerate mass market penetration, expand R&D capabilities, and broaden product application development, he said, noting that fermentation addresses multiple pain points in the egg industry from animal welfare, food safety and traceability issues to price volatility and supply chain challenges.
The Egg, from Canadian startup Noblegen, is the firm's first consumer product under the eunite brand showcasing the ‘ancient microorganism’ euglena gracilis, which it claims can produce proteins with exciting functional and nutritional characteristics... without using genetic engineering.
Other products in the eunite pipeline can replicate dairy and meat proteins, utilizing the unique properties of euglena, which has the metabolic capacity of both animals and plants, and can produce proteins that are similar from a nutrition and functionality standpoint to animal proteins, although they are "not identical from a peptide sequence standpoint,” says founder Adam Noble.
Boston-based synthetic biology specialist Motif FoodWorks is developing ‘high-impact’ proteins that could be added to plant- based meat and dairy formulations in small quantities but make a significant difference to the eating experience.
It’s also “trying to understand how structured fat systems could improve the juiciness, texture, and cooking performance of plant-based meats… we’re looking at novel processing techniques to create structured emulsions and pastes that can serve as a saturated fat replacement in plant-based meat, playing a similar role that coconut fat does today," says CTO Dr Mike Leonard.
While some companies are engineering microbes to produce key components found in breastmilk, such as lactoferrin or human milk oligosaccharides (HMOs), that can be added to infant formula, Singapore-based TurtleTree Labs is culturing human mammary cells that produce ‘real’ breastmilk, and has articulated a longer-term mission to produce cow's milk as well.
BIOMILQ – another startup producing breastmilk by culturing human mammary cells – is targeting the four fifths of women who transition to dairy-based formula before the recommended six-month exclusivity period for breastfeeding, but aren’t always happy about it, says co-founder Dr Leila Strickland.
“Whether it’s low milk production, medical challenges, incompatible workplaces, or the ongoing stigma around breastfeeding in public, mothers often feed infant formula out of necessity rather than preference.
“While there is no replacement for breastmilk, we believe we can harness the power of science, technology, and nature to deliver comprehensive and sustainable infant nutrition."
Unlike some other startups using synthetic biology to ‘program’ microbes to produce proteins, Chicago-based Nature’s Fynd is working with ‘extremophiles’ - fungal strains that can survive in extreme environments such as the volcanic springs at Yellowstone National Park - that naturally produce high levels of complete protein when grown in a controlled environment.
Rather than extracting the protein to make a concentrate or isolate, it is producing a whole food ingredient - dubbed 'FY’ - containing 50%+ protein, plus fibers, oils, and desirable micronutrients including vitamin B12 (highly desirable in a vegan protein), vitamin D, iron, and calcium.
Finished products containing 'FY' - from animal-free cream cheese, chicken nuggets, beef sliders and pork dumplings, to chocolate mousse - will be manufactured by co-packers using Nature's Fynd recipes.
San Leandro-based Geltor - which is using synthetic biology to engineer bacteria to produce collagen (which is currently extracted from animal skin, bones, and connective tissue) via a fermentation process – initially focused on collagen ingredients used in topical skincare products. It is now working with key partners on producing ingestible products that will hit the market in 2021, says co-founder Alex Lorestani.
“If anything, we’ve seen interest [in alternative sources of protein] intensify during the pandemic. Investors are all thinking about what sustainable protein means for global CPG businesses.”
To make PureTaste protein, MycoTechnology uses naturally occurring mycelia from an heirloom variety of Shiitake mushroom that converts feedstock containing pea and rice protein into a complete vegan protein with a PDCAAS score of 1.00 and 77% protein by dry weight. It can be supplied as a powder, as a protein crisp for products such as bars, or as a texturized product for meat alternatives.
The extruded (texturized) version of PureTaste delivers improved taste and greater oil and water-holding capacity in plant-based meat products (vs other extruded plant proteins), enabling firms to create juicier burgers and save money, claims the Colorado-based company, which has struck deals with a variety of brands to include the ingredient including JBS Foods subsidiary Planterra Foods.
Meati Foods is carving out new territory in the meat-alternative space with a fungi-based platform capable of producing ‘steaks’ and other whole cuts, disrupting a category currently dominated by processed products such as burgers and nuggets.
The mycelium-based ‘meat’ - grown via a submerged fermentation process - has “no inherent flavor and is bright white with long fibrous filaments that mimic muscle structure,” says founder and CEO Dr Tyler Huggins. “We’re at greater than 60% by weight protein and we have a PDCAAS score of 1, which is similar to eggs and milk.”
A spinoff from Ecovative - which uses mycelium in packaging, textiles, skincare and apparel - Atlast Food Co is also using mycelium, which it grows in trays via solid state fermentation to create ‘meaty’ fiber- and protein-rich slabs that can be cut and sliced into multiple shapes.
Founded by Beth Zotter (who had previously researched seaweed’s potential as a biofuel) and Dr. Amanda Stiles (who previously headed up research at plant-protein specialist Ripple Foods) in 2019, Trophic is looking to commercialize a 65% protein concentrate from higher-protein varieties of red seaweed that could work in a variety of applications from meat and seafood alternatives to salty snacks and protein bars.
Cell-cultured meat – grown from animal cells outside of the animal – deserves its own gallery, given the number of players in this nascent space. There are too many players to mention here, but keep up to date with FoodNavigator-USA’s coverage of this space HERE and check out our recent article featuring Memphis Meats VP KC Carswell: Is cell-cultured meat commercially viable?
Learn more HERE about this week's big news - regulatory approval in Singapore for Eat Just's cell-cultured chicken - via our sister site FoodNavigator-Asia.
Picture credit: Eat Just