From cow-free milk to plant-based burgers, ‘alt-food’ products have become supermarket shelf staples in recent years.
VCs are backing the trend: a fifth of the $2bn that Europe’s foodtech startups have raised in investment so far in 2024 has gone to alternative protein companies working on tech like mycelium, cultivated meat and cocoa-free chocolate, according to Dealroom.
Gone are the days where ‘plant-based’ could only mean a mush of peas and potatoes. But what could be the most successful animal alternative to make it to our plates? VCs from FoodLabs, Planet A and Grey Silo Ventures share the non-portfolio companies on their watchlists.
Nicolaus Norden, associate at FoodLabs
Nutrumami — Denmark
If you look at the ingredient lists of plant-based foods, many have one thing in common: they are still too long. This is due to the fact that ingredients are often used for one specific purpose, such as flavour, colour, texture or as a binding agent. Nutrumami has set out to create an all-round solution in the form of a multifunctional (for example, flavour- and nutrition-enhancing and salt-reducing) protein powder. Frederik Jensen, the CEO and cofounder, is an experienced gourmet chef with knowledge of consumer tastes.
Hulk Bio — UK
For some mothers, breastfeeding may not be possible for a variety of reasons, but existing alternatives do not meet the needs of many infants. This is where Hulk Bio comes in, with its cell-based human milk alternative. Christina Rode, founder and CEO of Hulk Bio, is taking a specific approach to the cells she is focusing on (using stem cells vs. mammary gland cells), which she believes will ultimately allow the company to scale up faster and more efficiently.
Christian Gonzalez, investor at Planet A
Cultimate Foods — Germany
There is no denying that there’s a gap in taste and texture between alternative and traditional meats, which often hinders the broader adoption of plant-based products. A promising solution to bridge this gap is the use of animal fat produced without animals. Cultimate Foods is doing exactly that: developing cell-cultivated fat as an ingredient to enhance the taste and texture of plant-based meats with promising favourable unit economics. This ingredient could have the potential to drive greater consumer acceptance of plant-based meats.
Foreverland Foods — Italy
The demand for innovative chocolate alternatives has never been higher. Foreverland Foods taps into the potential of carob — a legume that briefly gained traction in the 1970s as a chocolate substitute but struggled to win over consumers — to create an ingredient that closely replicates the taste and texture of milk chocolate. Foreverland claims that this new product not only delivers a superior nutritional profile but also offers a more sustainable and cost-effective production process compared to traditional chocolate, all while tasting like the real thing.
inSpek — France
Biomanufacturing commodity proteins remains a significant challenge in the food technology sector due to difficulties in achieving scalable production and the prohibitively high costs associated with the process. InSpek is developing an on-chip optical sensor that helps companies closely monitor biological and chemical processes in real-time — by allowing better sensing in the process, the products can lead to improvements in the yield of alternative proteins, impacting the unit economics and making precision fermentation more fiscally feasible.
Matteo Leonardi, investment manager at Grey Silo Ventures
Perfat — Finland
A spinout from Helsinki University, Perfat uses proprietary technology to make a healthy liquid oil that has the structure and versatility of conventional solid fats, while retaining the positive nutritional values of a vegetable oil. The product can then be used in other food products to offer a healthier alternative to solid fats.
Core Biogenesis — France
Core Biogenesis genetically modifies an oilseed plant to produce proteins that can make a range of products, like a growth medium to cultivate cells that can be used in the production of cultivated meat. This form of molecular farming is easily scalable compared to other methods that require bioreactors or vertical farming technologies, and the company says the use of a photosynthesising plant means its production process is carbon-negative.
Leonardi also chose to spotlight Foreverland Foods.
