Future Meat Technologies, a Rehovot, Israel-based enterprise engaged in developing technology to produce cultivated meat, has raised $347 million in Series B financing. The company, which plans to break ground for a large-scale production facility in the United States in 2022, announced on December 20 that it is now producing cultivated chicken breast for $7.70 per pound, or $1.70 per 110-gram chicken breast, down from under $18 per pound just six months ago.
The financing round was co-led by ADM Ventures, the venture investing arm of ADM, a global leader in human and animal nutrition. It also included participation from the Menora Mivtachim pension and insurance fund, which manages over $85 billion in assets; S2G Ventures;Tyson Ventures, the venture capital arm of Tyson Foods; Rich Products Ventures; Manta Ray Ventures; Emerald Technology Ventures; ADM Capital (Cibus Fund); and Bits x Bites.
“We are incredibly excited by the massive support of our global network of strategic and financial investors,” said Professor Yaakov Nahmias, founder and president of Future Meat. “This financing consolidates our position as the leading player in the cultivated meat industry, just three years after our launch. Our singular technology reduced production costs faster than anyone thought possible, paving the way for a massive expansion of operations.
“We’re excited to expand our relationship with Future Meat and expand the universe of new sources of protein to consumers who are increasingly diversifying their diets,” said Ian Pinner, senior vice president of strategy and innovation at ADM. “Partnerships like these are one of the key ways ADM is creating and capturing new value in growth segments like alternative proteins, and we’re eager to support the Future Meat team in their efforts to continue developing groundbreaking solutions that will provide high quality and scalable cultivated meat products to consumers in the years to come.”
Future Meat opened the world’s first cultivated meat production line in Israel in earlier 2021, and is now scouting several locations in the United States for its projected large scale production facility.
“While we are leading the pack as the fastest growing company in this space, I truly see the entire cultivated meat industry as a massive agent of change, creating a sustainable future for coming generations,” added Nahmias.
The professor added: “We have consistently demonstrated that our single-cell technology and serum-free media formulations can reach cost parity faster than the market anticipates. We also demonstrated that our proprietary media rejuvenation technology enables cell densities greater than 100 billion cells per liter, translating to production densities 10 times higher than the industrial standard.”
The proprietary technology, based on stainless steel fermenters which continuously remove waste products generated by ‘immortal’ tissue cells, maintains a constant physiological environment which supports rapid, natural, proliferation of animal cells. The company proved that this connective tissue method is more robust and efficient than others using stem cells, and that its rejuvenating fermenters can recycle over 70% of the nutrients. It is also highly cost efficient, a key factor in bringing cultivated meat to cost parity with traditional meat.
