GOOD Meat, the cultivated meat division of Eat Just, announced today that it has received regulatory approval from the Singapore Food Agency (SFA) for the use of serum-free media for the production of cultivated meat.
Many in the industry believe that using animal-free growth media will not only help the cultivated meat industry achieve what is effectively its raison d’être through the severing of reliance on a cruel animal agriculture industry, but it will also lead to greater scalability, lower manufacturing costs, and a more sustainable product. It also paves the way for the production of larger quantities of real chicken made from cells.
GOOD Meat had previously obtained approval from SFA for its first chicken product in November 2020, and subsequent approval for new formats of its poultry in November 2021. With the latest regulatory approval for serum-free cultivation media, Eat Just says its cell ag meat division will soon transition to a more efficient and favorable production process.
According to the company, its chicken has been featured on menus at restaurants, in hawker stalls, and via food delivery. And now, beginning this month, diners can reserve weekly tables to try out Good Meat’s cultivated chicken at Huber’s Butchery, a Singaporean producer and supplier of meat products.
The company is also working on a Singapore production facility with production partner ABEC. According to Good Meat, the new facility will hold the largest bioreactor in the cultivated meat industry and will be able to use the serum-free production process for its cultivated meat when it opens next year.
“Not too long ago, observers thought removing serum was a major limiting step to scaling cultivated meat,” said Josh Tetrick, co-founder and CEO of Eat Just. “I could not be prouder of our team for doing just that and receiving approval to commercialize it this week. It’s yet another step forward for our company, the cultivated meat industry, and the health of our planet.”
This week has been a big one for animal-free growth media. On Monday, Multus announced they had raised $9.5 million to fund the production of a growth media production plant. And yesterday, cultivated meat pioneer Mosa Meat announced they had been able to grow cultivated fat without fetal-bovine serum.
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