October 23, 2019

 

Future Meat Technologies lab-grown meat aims to hit stores by 2022

 

The company pilot production facilities could lower production costs of its cell-made steak to only US$10 per pound (~US$22 per kilogram), or only US$4 if plant-based meat substitutes were combined with the cell-made steak, reported TechCrunch.

 

The problem with many existing companies growing meat from cultivated animal cells have always been the high production costs.

 

But Future Meat Technologies new US$14 million financing could be the catalyst for commercially viable lab-grown meat production - a much lower target than the initial US$50 million announced by Good Food Institute experts announced in April this year.

 

Rom Kshuk, CEO of Future Meat Technologies, said it aims to achieve commercially viable production costs within the next two years, developing a worldwide network of meat and ingredient supply chain market expert investors and advisors along the way.

 

While competitors aim to sell their meat directly to consumers, Future Meat Technologies will instead become a supplier – supplying the necessary hardware and cell lines required for a third party to produce their own lab-grown meat.

 

This is similar to Future Meat Technologies investor Tyson Foods. The latter slaughters and processes chicken raised by contracted poultry farmers. Tyson Foods supplies the means for raising the chickens to the farmers.

 

Yaakov Nahmias, founder and chief science officer of Future Meat Technology said their lab-grown meat uses undifferentiated fibroblast cells that turns into fat cells or muscle cells when triggered by small molecules. Growing fat cells or muscle cells are transferred into a culture with a specific resin that removes waste materials - an obstruction to large scale growth. That resin, a new bioreactor design, increases yield to 80%. In essence, you can grow 800 grams of biomass in the same time needed to grow 100 grams of biomass before.

 

Future Meat Technologies uses Chinese hamster ovaries cells (not fetal bovine serum) to grow its meat products. A manufacturer using Future Meat equipment could grow half a ton of fat and meat in 14 days, or two cows' worth of meat in one month.

 

The company said compared to traditional meat farming, its manufacturing model reduces land use by 99% and emits 80% less greenhouse gases.

 

Its ultimate goal is producing meat at costs similar to conventional beef.

 

Future Meat Technologies is funded by Tyson Ventures, Swiss investment firm Emerald Technology Ventures, Chicago-based venture firm S2G Ventures and Chinese food and agriculture startup investor Bits x Bites.

 

-  TechCrunch