November 24, 2021

By Lynda Kiernan-Stone, Global AgInvesting Media

While many startups claiming to make animal-free cheeses use starches, soy, or nuts to mimic the texture and characteristics of traditional cheese, New Culture is pioneering a new method of combining traditional cheesemaking methods with fermentation and food science to create the first animal-free cheese that stretches and bubbles like classic cheese. 

The company, which has already proven its ability to produce animal-free casein and animal-free mozzarella, has now closed on an oversubscribed $25 million Series A to make the transition to a commercial entity through new hires and scaling up their production capacity. 

The round was led by Ahren Innovation Capital and CPT Capital, and included new investors ADM Ventures, Be8 Ventures, S2G Ventures, and Future Ventures. Existing investors joining the round were Evolv Ventures, the corporate venture arm of Kraft Heinz, SOSV’s IndieBio, Bee Partners, Mayfield, Alumni Ventures Group, and Bluestein Ventures.

“We’re thrilled to close our Series A with an incredible syndicate of existing and new investors,” said Matt Gibson and Inja Radman, co-founders, New Culture. “The progress we have made with our science and our cheese is a testament to the world-class team we have been fortunate enough to build and work alongside. We can’t wait to dive into this next phase of scale up and production to offer our delicious, melty, animal-free cheese to pizza lovers all across the country.”

Milk and meat alternatives made from almonds, soy, peas, flax, coconut, cashews, oats, or rice continue to be widely adopted by consumers who are eager to fund products that they view as healthier sources of protein while answering the call from animal welfare advocates.

But cheese has been a different story. Cheese is more complex – mainly because of casein proteins that make cheese all the things we love – melty, tangy, and gooey – all characteristics that are exceedingly hard to replicate using plants.

However, New Culture is leading a way to an animal-free dairy future through its ability to make animal-free casein — the key ingredient that creates the melt and stretch of real cheese. Controlling this ingredient enables the company to produce offerings such as New Culture mozzarella – indistinguishable from conventional products in taste, texture, function, and nutritional content, while being better for the consumer, planet, and food system. New Culture plans to launch its mozzarella in 2022.

“CPT Capital is delighted to continue to back New Culture on its mission to create a more ethical and sustainable dairy company,” said round co-lead CPT Capital. “Using cutting-edge technology and expertise, New Culture is creating cheese with the taste and texture of traditionally animal derived cheese, but with none of the negative impacts on the health of our planet, animals and human health.”

By harnessing the power of animal-free casein, this is the first animal-free cheese that has the elasticity and characteristics of classic cheese. Exhibiting this, the company has hosted an extensive series of pizza tastings with industry experts that have highlighted the product’s melting point which is applicable in both 850° professional pizza ovens and 500° home ovens – compared to plant-based competitors that top out at 500°.

“What New Culture has accomplished in a short period of time through their several pizza tastings reinforces their market-leading position in developing animal-free casein,” said Steve Sanger, general partner, Evolv Ventures and New Culture board member. “Their focus on using that casein to produce animal-free cheese will allow consumers to enjoy everything they love about cheese (taste, melt, stretch, browning) without having to compromise, all while helping to make the world more sustainable.”

– Lynda Kiernan-Stone is editor with GAI Media, and is managing editor and daily contributor for Global AgInvesting’s AgInvesting Weekly News and  Agtech Intel News, as well as HighQuest Group’s Oilseed & Grain News. She can be reached at lkiernan-stone@globalaginvesting.com.