Avant Meats, which makes cell-based fish, announced today that it is establishing new R&D and pilot production facilities in Singapore, created with the support of the Singapore Economic Board.
The Hong Kong-based Avant cultivates fish cells to make cultured fish products, starting with sea cucumber and fish maw. The company says it is the first cultivated meat startup in China and the first cultivated fish startup in Asia.
This new facility is just the latest move from Avant to scale up production of its cultivated fish and bring it to the mainstream. Last month, Avant announced that it had achieved a 90 percent cost reduction in the production of its cultivated fish, and that it had partnered with Chinese biopharmaceutical company QuaCell to bring those costs down another 75 percent.
In the press announcement emailed to The Spoon, Carrie Chan, Co-founder and CEO, Avant said “Singapore provides Avant with regulatory clarity, international talents, and sufficient space for the next step of scaling up.”
Indeed, Singapore has been a leader in the cultured protein space. Singapore became the first country in the world to authorize the sale of cultured meat back in December of 2020. Singapore residents can now even order cultured meat for home delivery, thanks to a partnership between Eat Just and foodpanda.
But Avant is also the latest cultivated meat company to build a pilot production facility. BlueNalu, a U.S.-based cultivated fish startup, raised $60 million this year to open its pilot facility in San Diego this year. And Israeli startup Aleph Farms announced its plans to have its BioFarm pilot plant operational by 2022.
Getting these pilot production facilities up and running is a key step in cultivated meat achieving mainstream adoption. When the BlueNalu facility goes live, it will produce 200 – 500 pounds of commercial grade cultivated fish a week for restaurants and other foodservice operators. As the production of cultivated fish and other proteins ramp up, the cost will come down, bringing much-needed price parity with traditional, animal-based meat.
