April 4, 2018

The nascent cultured meat segment got another vote of confidence from investors with startup Wild Type grabbing $3.5 million in funding, led by Spark Capital, with participation from Root Ventures, Mission Bay Capital, and a group of angel investors. The company is developing a tool to multiply animal cells to create meat, as opposed to a plant-based meat substitute.  The funds will be used to scale up its cellular growth infrastructure, which will allow for increased manufacturing capability and a lower price point.

Wild Type was founded by former U.S. diplomat Justin Kolbeck and aspiring cardiologist Arye Elfenbein. Their goal in creating the company was to “address the most pressing challenges of our generation: climate change, food security, and health”. Their development process has included extensive collaboration with food enthusiasts and chefs across their native West Coast.

“We wanted to make sure we were building something that people would love, so from day one we reached out to friends in the food business,” Kolbeck told TechCrunch. As befitting their Northwest roots, the company’s first meat is a minced salmon for use in products such as sushi rolls.

Cultured Meat Field is Growing More Crowded

Wild Type is hardly the first entrant in the cultured meat sub-sector, whose products are also known as “clean meat”, as it cuts out breeding, raising, or the slaughtering of animals. In January of this year, Israel-based biotech startup SuperMeat raised a Seed round of $3 million backed by U.S.-based venture capital fund New Crop Capital, mission-focused venture capital firm Stray Dog Capital, and European poultry producer PHW.

In 2017 San Francisco-based Memphis Meats announced it has raised a $17 million series A  led by leading venture capital firm DFI. The round also included a long list of notable investors such as Cargill, Bill Gates, Richard Branson, New Crop Capital, SOSV, Fifty Years, Atomico, KBW Ventures, Inevitable Ventures, Kimbal Musk, Suzy and Jack Welch, Kyle Vogt, and multiple research institutions.

With global protein consumption expected to climb at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 1.7 percent, reaching 943 million tons by 2054, demand for clean meat is only expected to grow, especially as it is seen as more environmentally friendly. Just last week, three impact investment companies: Dao Ventures, Moonspire Social Ventures, and New Crop Capital partnered to launch Dao Foods International Inc., (DFI) a collaborative effort to meet China’s rising demand for protein through plant-based and lab-cultured meat.

The market potential is bolstered by recent research showing a large number of U.S. and UK consumers are open to eating clean meat – 40 percent in the U.S.. In an interesting twist the segment of consumers in the survey most interested in sampling lab grown meat were vegans, at 60 percent.

By David Nitchman, GAI Media