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Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

foodtech

A New Report Details Promise (and Challenges) of Canada’s Food & Ag Tech Ecosystem

The Canadian food and agtech ecosystem is experiencing significant growth, according to a new report published today by the Canadian Food Innovation Network.

The report, which dives deep into specific sectors, funding, sector sizing, key challenges and opportunities, says the Canadian agrifoodtech ecosystem lags behind global leaders in both funding and company concentration. According to the report, USD $1.6 billion has been invested in the sector since 2018, with plant-based proteins emerging as Canada’s largest food tech domain, valued at USD $1.7 billion in 2023. However, compared to its global peers, which tend to allocate just 17% of total agrifoodtech investments into agtech, Canada is a bit over-indexed in agtech with 44% of investments compared to 56% invested in food tech (56%).

Despite a total investment in food tech that is smaller relative to its global peers, the report says Canada is establishing itself as a hub for plant-based proteins, biotech-enabled functional foods, and upcycled ingredients:

“The Plant-Based sector is the most significant, comprising 26% of the Canadian food tech ecosystem (investment), compared to 14% globally. This is followed by Functional Foods & Drinks, representing 12% of companies, and Biotech/ Synthetization—primarily focused on specialty ingredients —with 7% of the Canadian food tech ecosystem. All three domains are also amongst the top five most represented globally.“

According to the report, the Canadian food and ag tech ecosystem faces key challenges relative to the US and other markets, the biggest of which is a lack of private capital. Only 40% of food tech investment rounds are backed by venture capital, compared to 60% in the UK and US. This means a heavy reliance on public grants, which comprise nearly 30% of total funding. This is much higher than in the UK (5%) and US (8%). Other challenges include limited scaling resources due to the country’s large geography and lower overall population density, a fragmented regulatory environment and lack of a national food tech strategy.

Despite these challenges, Canadian Food Innovation Network CEO Dana McCauley is optimistic about the sector’s future.

“These challenges are daunting: labour shortages, supply chain vulnerabilities, climate change, and slow rates of innovation threaten the resilience and sustainability of our food system. Yet, Canada’s foodtech ecosystem is rising to the occasion. By leveraging its unique strengths in plant-based proteins, biotech-enabled functional foods, upcycled ingredients, and beyond, the sector is driving transformative innovations that enhance sustainability, boost economic productivity, and create jobs across the country.”

If you’d like to read the full report, you can find it on the CFIN website.

CES 2025 Food Tech Preview

Welcome to The Spoon’s CES 2025 Food Tech Exhibitor Preview!

We’ve scoured through the exhibitor guide and press releases to find some of the products that will be on display at CES 2025 that may interest you. We’ve categorized the different products so you can easily find what interests you—from food robots like Apecoo’s automated waffle and flatbread-making machines to smart ovens and kitchen appliances. This year’s beverage tech lineup includes kombucha makers, home coffee robots, and more. Big names like Kirin are also making an appearance with innovative (and slightly quirky) ideas like their salt-detecting spoon. Unsurprisingly, AI is being incorporated into everything, from the latest smart ovens to nutrition coaches.

Be sure to check out our CES Food Tech walk-around guide for a clickable and sortable list of all the food tech products on display at CES! And if you’re in Vegas, The Spoon is putting on a happy hour for smart home and smart kitchen industry folks. Please drop by!

Now let’s get to the products…

Food Robots

Apecoo Robotic Waffle Maker

Apecoo, based in Silicon Valley, will show of its Roti/Tortilla Robot Baker at CES 2025. This appliance automates the process of making various flatbreads, including roti, chapati, tortilla, tawa, and dosa. It measures and mixes flour, oil, and water, kneads the mixture into dough balls, and then flattens and cooks them to the desired consistency. The device features noise reduction technology for quiet operation, infrared shortage detection for smart monitoring, and an “Auto Alert & Stop” function for enhanced safety.

The company also makes a robotic waffle maker, which has sensors to detect the doneness of the waffle, and cooks the robot from start to finish.

FrazyBot

The FrazyBot is a countertop home beverage robot that makes specialty drinks ranging from cocktails like spicy margaritas to boba tea and coffee drinks. The robot, first introduced at last year’s CES, is available for preorder for $399. FrazyBot is modular and comes with a base module that has a touch panel and water reservoir. Users order their drink boxes from the website and once-inserted, the Frazybot will mix them. The company behind them, Frazy, is known for its coffee and beverage concentrates it ships to consumers via a DTC model and this appliance looks like a way for them possibly create another line of business for their beverage mixes. The biggest downside, in my opinion, is that the robot makes single-use drinks from each package – which seems like a big waste of packaging and cost for a home robot.

Artly Coffee Robots

Amazing Robotic A.I. Drinks and Coffee at Artly Coffee in Downtown Seattle, WA

Artly makes AI-powered barista bots that use deep learning and computer vision. The company says its robots are trained by award-winning professionals to perform complex tasks, including precise latte art. The company already has its robot barists operating in multiple locations across the U.S. and Canada and says its robots have served over half a million cups of specialty coffee, contributing to a significant revenue increase from $100,000 in 2021 to $1.8 million in 2023.

Health & Nutrition Tech

The Kirin Salt Spoon

We first saw Kirin making the rounds with its weird but intriguing Electric Salt Spoon in early 2024, and it looks like they’ll be bringing it to Vegas for CES. The device amplifies food’s saltiness by applying an electric current to the tongue. According to the product’s co-developer, the product works by using the current to draw more sodium into contact with the tongue, which in turn enhances the perceived saltiness of the food.

Netri’s Organ-on-Chip Platform Will Meaure for Food Toxicity Analysis

NETRI’s technology leverages its NeuroFluidics Care platform, which integrates advanced neuroscience and bioengineering to assess the toxic effects of compounds, including those used in the food industry. NETRI uses “organ-on-a-chip” systems, small devices engineered to mimic the structure and function of human organs, and these chips replicate aspects of the nervous system, enabling researchers to observe how compounds interact with neural tissues. The platform creates functional neural networks that are exposed to food-related compounds. By simulating human neural responses, it provides insights into the potential effects of these compounds on human health.

OrthoFoodie

The OrthoFoodie platform is a personalized nutrition and health optimization tool that integrates multiple features to deliver tailored dietary insights. According to the company’s website, users can log their meals or select from a database of foods and recipes. The platform analyzes the nutritional content of these inputs, providing detailed feedback on how they align with individual health goals. Based on user-specific data such as age, activity level, health objectives, and dietary preferences, OrthoFoodie generates recommendations to improve energy, immunity, and cognitive function.

Jelly Drops

Jelly Drops are sugar-free water candy that boosts independent hydration, support health and aid brain function. Made with 95% water, plus added electrolytes and vitamins. Originally created to assist individuals with dementia who often face challenges in maintaining adequate fluid intake, these treats have gained popularity among a broader audience seeking to boost their hydration.

Home Beverage Tech

The Kombu

KOMBU The Fermenstation

While kombucha is a little less trendy than just a couple years ago, those still on board the kombucha train can look to make it at home with the KOMBU Fermenstation countertop kombucha maker. The Fermenstation features a dual-compartment system: a 3.5-liter front glass jar for primary fermentation and a rear section holding four flavoring and secondary fermentation bottles. Each compartment is equipped with temperature-controlled heating pads to maintain optimal fermentation conditions. Users can monitor and control the brewing process via a mobile app, which allows for setting timers and adjusting temperatures remotely. This appliance is appealing mostly because it would allow would-be home kombucha brewers to sidestep the traditional method that requires keeping big piece of mold in a jar called a ‘mother’ alive.

Medipresso Smart Tea Maker

[MEDIPRESSO] IoT-Based Tea & Coffee Dual-Nozzle Capsule Machine

Medipresso’s Medino is a connected tea and coffee capsule machine focused on healthy beverage experiences. The machine, which is compatible with Nespresso capsules, uses dual nozzles to extra both tea and coffee. The device uses an app called Medina which the company says uses AI to make healthy tea recommendations.

Vinxper Electric Wine Decanter

The Vinxper Expert is a 4th-generation electric wine aerator which patented technology that allows precise adjustment of decanting times from 0 to 240 minutes, effectively replacing traditional glass decanters. Designed to enhance the flavor of young wines aged 3 to 7 years, it addresses common issues found in existing electric aerators, such as battery leakage and unstable aeration, by incorporating Type-C charging and a water-resistant design.

Grad Wine Cooler

GRAD, established in 2015 and based in Denmark, makes the Grad No.1, is a 100% portable and rechargeable wine cooler that maintains precise temperature control for any wine. The Grad has a battery life of up to 15 hours and a full recharge time of 2.5 hours,

OviBar Water Bar

Ovi le bar à eau économique, pratique et écologique

The OviBar is yet another water dispensing system. Still, this one connects directly to your home’s water supply and provides instant access to purified water at hot, cold, or room temperature. It has a three-stage filtration system, which includes two filters and UV sterilization, which the company claims effectively removes impurities while preserving essential minerals. It has a dedicated baby bottle mode that delivers water at an optimal 37°C, making it quick and efficient for infant feeding preparations.

Coffee Tech

Flavor Craft AI

Flavor Craft AI: The Ultimate Custom Coffee Experience Created by AI

The Flavor Craft AI system is a home food coffee blending appliance that uses AI to create personalized coffee mixes based on five flavor preferences (acidity, bitterness, astringency, richness and coffee strength.

Outin Portable Espresso Machine

How To Make Espresso With The OutIn Nano Portable Espresso Machine (Ground Coffee)

Want your Joe on the go? The Outin Nano might be for you. The Outin Nano Portable Espresso Machine is a compact, self-heating espresso-making appliance that allows you to brew espresso in your car, while camping or wherever you want to go. It weighs approximately 670 grams and standing about 9 inches tall, and the company claims it can make a rich crema and robust espresso comparable to traditional machines. It has a rapid heating system that brings water to optimal brewing temperature in 200 seconds, and the 7500 mAh rechargeable battery supports up to five extractions with cold water or over 200 with preheated water on a single charge.

REAL9 Fit Stepper Lever Home Coffee Robot

REAL9 FIT: Next-Generation Sustainable Espresso Machine

The REAL9 Fit home espresso maker from Zeroth Law utilizes a stepper motor instead of a boiler to extract espresso, which the company claims results in 97% less energy consumption compared to traditional machines. Its precise pressure control minimizes unwanted chemical reactions, ensuring non-rancid, full-flavored coffee. With a compact design, intuitive interface, and shareable extraction profiles, the REAL9 FIT empowers users to create barista-level coffee effortlessly, making it a versatile and eco-conscious choice for both professionals and enthusiasts.

AstroBrew

AstroBrew is an innovative countertop appliance that revolutionizes cold brew coffee preparation by reducing the traditional 12-24 hour steeping process to just minutes. Astro Brew says it uses patent-pending thermodynamic semiconductor technology, which combines pressure, turbulence, and recirculation to extract coffee flavors efficiently, resulting in a smooth, less acidic brew. The company says it can brew up to 34 ounces of cold brew coffee and keep it fresh for up to 30 days without refrigeration.

Beer Tech

Beer-o-Meter Portable Beer Testing Lab

We bring the LAB to you with Beer-o-Meter

The Beer-o-Meter is a portable lab testing tool for brewers. Compact and portable, this cube-shaped measures key brewing metrics like pH and ABV with no chemicals required. The company says the device has already undergone pilot testing with Dutch breweries, provided feedback that has been integrated into its ongoing development. Initially tailored for the craft beer market, the Beer-o-Meter leverages bioassay technology to ensure precise and reliable results, and the company plans to expand its applications into the point-of-care market.

Laxppy Automated Beer Dispenser

According to the company, the Laxppy Automatic Beer Dispenser is an automated beer dispenser for food service environments. It features two automatic outlets capable of dispensing two glasses of beer in just 12 seconds. Additionally, a manual outlet is available for more traditional pouring methods. The dispenser accommodates beer glass sizes ranging from 300cc to 500cc, making it versatile for various serving preferences. A 7.1-inch touch display provides an intuitive interface for easy operation and monitoring.

Smart Ovens

Agari Kitchen

Agari is developing a cooking robot designed which is says uses ” 3D scanning, remote temperature sensing, and precision algorithms. While more specific details about its features and capabilities are not yet publicly available, the company is preparing for an upcoming launch and encourages interested individuals to subscribe for updates.

DaanTech’s Fantastic Oven

Daan Tech is showcasing its Fantastic Oven at CES, which it first debuted at last year’s CES. The oven, which also goes by Joe (following the same naming convention as it had with its Bob dishwasher), is available for pre-sale now and will be available first in Europe. The oven features a microwave, steam, air fryer, convection and grill/toaster capabilities.

Chef AI

Chef AI, which debuted its oven at CES 2024, will be showing off its intelligent cookware system that utilizes thermal, weight, and dimensional data to monitor and control the cooking process. This advanced technology ensures precise cooking without the need for constant monitoring or external probes and has the capability to cook over 100 different foods.

Smart Kitchen

Spicerr Smart Spice Dispenser

If you’re looking for something a little different in smart kitchen this year at CES, check out the Spicerr smart spice dispenser that optimizes food flavoring and nutrient intake. The connected device uses interchangeable spice capsules and an app to provide precise seasoning tailored to the user’s taste preferences. The company says it has 100 high-quality spices, herbs, and extracts available in sealed capsules. The dispenser’s touchscreen interface allows for manual or automated dispensing, while the accompanying app uses AI to offer personalized recipes, flavor suggestions, and nutritional tracking.

Lissome R1 Tiny Dishwasher

LISSOME R1 Dishwasher: Clean, Dry , and Disinfect in One! 🌟

The Lissome R1 is a compact dishwasher designed for small apartments or homes where traditional dishwashers are impractical. The R1 is 11 inches wide, and uses ‘Sweeping Jet Technology’ with two bottom-rotating and two patented vertical spray arms, the R1 uses high-speed jets at 45,000 Pa to thoroughly clean dishes in just 15 minutes.

Versaware

A Visit With Versaware at CES 2023

We first saw VersaWare at CES in 2023, and they are back this year with their AI-powered smart cooking assistant designed to provide nutritional insights and personalized meal planning. With voice-activated commands, it offers features such as Nutrition Awareness, allowing users to monitor their intake of calories, carbohydrates, and vitamins. The Meal Building tool helps users craft recipes tailored to their dietary preferences, providing nutritional information for each ingredient. Recipe Discovery suggests dishes based on available ingredients, while Pantry Management keeps track of a person’s food inventory, alerting users to low-stock items and monitors expiration dates.

LG

LG will unveil the 36-inch Smart InstaView French Door Refrigerator, which as a fully transparent T-OLED display embedded in the upper right door, serving as both a touch interface and a Dual InstaView panel. This display allows users to view the fridge’s contents without opening the door and showcases hologram-like visuals. For some reason, the fridge provides a curated music playlist.

The company will also show off its ThinQ Food management system, powered by a built-in AI camera, which the company says will automatically identify stored items, suggest recipes based on ingredients and preferences, and track inventory and expiration dates.

Finally, LG will show off its new SIGNATURE microwave with entertainment and smart home integration. Equipped with three built-in cameras, it enables real-time cooking monitoring, time-lapse creation, and tracking of meals’ heating progress. Paired with the induction range powered by Gourmet AI, the microwave identifies ingredients and suggests recipes. The microwave has a 27-inch Full-HD touchscreen with InstaView, built-in speakers, and Wi-Fi connectivity, and LG says it can double as a hub for managing smart home devices through the LG ThinQ Smart Home Dashboard, supporting LG AI appliances and Matter/Thread-compatible devices.

Rejuvenate Fog-Powered Smart Garden

No, the Rejuvenate by Plantaform this isn’t a steam punk garden, but instead a smart garden that uses something called fogponics—a method of delivering nutrients to plant roots via nutrient-rich fog—to grow a variety of herbs, vegetables, flowers, and plants year-round. Designed for ease of use, it accommodates 15 plant pods and requires refilling only every 2-3 weeks, thanks to its efficient water usage. The system is managed through the Plantaform App, which allows users to monitor plant health, adjust light schedules, and receive care guidance.

Restaurant and Food Retail

PickPad

We’ve seen many smart checkout systems in recent years at CES, but Pickpad is a little different in that it is tailored for restaurants as a smart order pickup system. It enables restaurants to put orders-to-go on a smart pad. The modular system utilizes sensors and machine learning to integrate into existing food service environments and their point-of-sale systems without altering current processes. It automatically double-checks order accuracy, updates order statuses in real time, collects comprehensive data points, and personalizes the customer experience by displaying customer names when orders are ready.

What’s Next For Cellular Agriculture: 5 Takeaways From Tufts Cellular Agriculture Innovation Day

Pioneers in cellular agriculture came together in Boston last week to discuss the state of the industry – and what it will take to take cell-cultivated products to the next level.

Tufts University’s inaugural Cellular Agriculture Innovation Day featured panel discussions with industry leaders, researchers, and other experts. The panelists reflected on how far the technology to grow meat and other products has come over the last decade, and shared their visions of how that momentum will continue over the next few years.

A decade ago, “you could count the number of people dedicated to cellular agriculture on one hand,” said Isha Datar, executive director of the research nonprofit New Harvest, in a panel discussion at the event.

“To see 10 years go by, and to see 150 companies pop up, so much private investment pop up, lots more people in the academic space – to me, it’s like, ‘okay, the party has been started,’” Datar said.


All eyes on cell culture media

Cellular agriculture has many research and development hurdles to clear in coming years, said Mark Post, chief scientific officer at Mosa Meats, in a panel discussion.

In particular, the industry still needs to work “quite extensively” on the cost-effectiveness – and in particular, the resource efficiency – of its manufacturing processes, Post said.

The biggest cost driver for cell-cultivated products today is culture media: the nutrient-rich material that supports the growth of cells.

According to Andrew Stout, a PhD student focusing on cultivated cell lines and culture media at Tufts University, the cellular agriculture field has already seen success in cutting costs for some culture media components, such as growth factors.

Those components were the “low-hanging fruit” of culture media, Stout said at the event.

Moving forward, researchers in the field will likely address “the next lowest fruit,” such as amino acids and vitamins, he said.


Collaborating to solve key questions

Datar, the executive director at New Harvest, forecast that industry players will increasingly find answers to their questions by working together.

Much of the news from the industry in recent years has concerned individual companies and products – but over the next decade, we’ll hear more about how different companies and other players are working together to “solve [the] puzzle,” Datar said.

In particular, companies collaboratively address the challenge of scaling up using shared facilities, she said.

In 2021, we saw an announcement for one such facility in Europe: the Cultured Food Innovation Hub planned by Swiss flavor manufacturer Givaudan and other partners. The companies planned the Innovation Hub as a space for startups to access shared equipment, enabling more players to innovate in the field at lower cost.


Securing public funding

Bruce Friedrich, president and co-founder of the Good Food Institute, forecast that public funding will play an increasingly important role in helping the industry to address challenges of cost and scale.

In the last three years, governments around the world have already “gone from almost zero to hundreds of millions of dollars” in funding, Friedrich said.

Friedrich laid out a vision of government funding for cellular agriculture that would mirror investments in renewable energy and electric vehicles.

In the U.S., there could be bipartisan support for spending to support the industry, he said – pointing to efforts by the Good Food Institute to communicate with Republican lawmakers about the potential employment and economic benefits of such spending.


Introducing cell-cultivated products to the public

The speakers at the Tufts event also addressed the need to continue improving cell-cultivated products themselves before introducing them to consumers.

For Post, the chief scientific officer at Mosa Meats, one step to improve product quality could be improving the differentiation of muscle and fat tissues.

Academia can help to improve the quality of cell-cultivated products by identifying which genetic features can identify cells that will produce tasty end-products, according to Stout, the PhD student at Tufts University.

According to David Block, a professor of chemical engineering at the University of California, Davis, another task for academia will be to ensure that cell-cultivated products are nutritionally equivalent to their conventional equivalents.

But the industry also has “an opportunity” to take more control over the nutritional quality and safety of its products than conventional agriculture, because cell-cultivated products are grown in much more controlled environments, Block said in a panel discussion at the event.


Moving toward semi-industrialization

The industry has begun to receive its first regulatory stamps of approval, and is “at the verge of getting regulatory approval in a lot of geographies,” according to Post.

In November, UPSIDE Foods became the first company to receive a “no questions” letter from the FDA – meaning the agency determined that the company’s cell-cultivated chicken is safe for consumers.

Eat Just, a San-Francisco startup, became the first company to receive regulatory approval for cell-cultivated meat when the Singapore Food Agency green-lit its cell-cultivated chicken in 2020.

With regulatory clearance in the works, and factories beginning to be built, “we are really getting to the level where [the industry] becomes sort of semi-industrial,” Post said.

But he added: “It will take a long time before [cell-cultivated products] will be a substantial part of markets where eventually we can make an impact on the environment, which is the root of all this.”

Uma Valeti, chief executive officer of UPSIDE Foods, said that it could be between 10 and 30 years before cultivated meat “takes off.”

NotCo Built a Unicorn Using AI To Accelerate Food Innovation. CEO Matias Muchnick Tells The Spoon How They Did It

When Matias Muchnick started NotCo in 2015, food innovation was a slow-moving process.

“Food R&D was three guys in lab coats, doing trial and error in a developmental kitchen,” said Muchnick in a recent interview with The Spoon. “Reading research papers from 1980 about using soy to replace animal-based ingredients. That was it. So whenever you have an industry that has a very obsolete technology, then a lot of bad things happen.”

He and his co-founders wanted to create new plant-based food products, but they wanted to do it in a new way that didn’t rely on antiquated methodologies. Eventually, they started wondering if using technology like artificial intelligence could help them make better decisions and help create new types of food faster.

They decided yes and started building an extensive database of information about all the components that create the taste and experience of food.

“Your machine learning will always be directly proportionate to the amount of data and the dimensions of data that you collect,” said Muchnick. “So from the very beginning, understanding what data was relevant for the objective that we were trying to do, which was replacing animals with plants, was important to us.”

Their database was comprised of chemical and biological attributes that made food what it is and the attributes that impacted the human perception of taste, texture, smell, and color. The goal, said Muchnick, was to create a large enough database of information to use their AI (which would eventually be called Guiseppe) to create a whole line of new plant-based food products.

“We wanted to build a general-purpose artificial intelligence,” he said. “Not an algorithm that is only great at doing mayo, or a burger, or yogurt. The things you’d like from a burger are very different from what you’d like from yogurt, so (we wanted to know) how we could get a real understanding of the human brain to create an algorithm that would attack all of the categories of products. That was super important from the get-go.”

Seven years later, his company is an alt-protein unicorn: the company is growing very fast in the North American alt milk category, just started a joint venture with a food giant, and this week debuted a new alt-meat product at the natural foods show in Los Angeles.

So how does the platform that made all that possible work?

Muchnick gives an example of how the process would work if Giuseppe were used to, say, make a new kind of cheese.

“The algorithm comes up with this crazy amount of recipes and processes attached to each ingredient that we put into it,” said Muchnick. From there, they would take recipes and take them to the “AI test kitchen,” where a group of fifteen chefs try the product out, make the recipe, and then have it evaluated by a trained panel.

“The trained panel gives feedback to the algorithm. Maybe the formulation was good or bad, we feedback the algorithm with the good things and the bad things. So we feedback the algorithm with the many dimensions of the sensory aspects.”

Muchnick says its this continous loop where AI-generated concepts, recipes, and processes are tested in a kitchen, critiqued with feedback, which is then fed back into Guiseppe, which helps NotCo’s AI get better and better.

“You get an algorithm that is working on improving every single day with 1000 recipes.”

But it’s not just recipes getting better, but the optimization of processes around which they run experiments. Muchnick gives the example of a project on frothing plant-based milk. Instead of spending months experimenting with different ways to achieve it, Muchnick says it will help show faster routes to success to help deliver results in a week.

“Instead of starting from scratch with every food formulation you want to create, or any expression you want to create, the AI is telling the food scientist to go through different routes. The algorithm is optimizing every single set of experiments.”

And its this process and the success ultimately drew in Kraft Heinz to consider working with NotCo.

“Kraft Heinz said, guys, you do food products in a quality we’ve never seen before, at a pace we’ve never seen before, and with an agility and an execution that we haven’t seen before,'” said Muchnick. “‘How do you guys do it, and how can we partner up?'”

The answer to that question would eventually be a joint venture.

“They were like, ‘Why don’t we bring superior plant-based products with the familiarity of our brands and with your know-how of executing amazing R&D based products?'”

“And,” said Muchnick, “we’re like, ‘Yeah, I mean, that makes a ton of sense.'”

If you’d like to hear my full conversation with Muchnick about how they are using AI to accelerate food development, just click play below.

HakkoBako is Making Connected Fermentation Chambers for Pros and Home Foodies

While fermented food has long made up an important and tasty part of our diets, this food powered by healthy microorganisms is finding newfound interest nowadays everywhere from the high-end restaurant to the home hobbyist to the food science lab.

However, even as this century old process enters the modern day zeitgeist, there hasn’t been much innovation in the tools in recent decades that help chefs or home cooks try their hand at fermentation. Oftentimes, chefs just use a variety of mason jars and crocks to ferment their food, or just repurpose other equipment, like combi-ovens or dehydrators, to act as makeshift fermenters.

All of which got Hong Kong-based food entrepreneur Tommy Leung asking why there wasn’t more modern equipment to empower the professional or home chef when it came to fermentation. Leung saw an opportunity to create a modern piece of equipment that would enable chefs to have multiple fermentation projects in process at once, where they could manage their fermented food with precise monitoring tools while not turning their kitchens into something resembling an eighteenth-century apothecary’s lab.

The result is HakkoBako, an IoT-connected fermentation chamber for professional food producers. The HakkoBako will have both an app as well as a touchscreen on the front of the device where users can start projects, control temperature and humidity for their fermentation food, and monitor their food with precise data logs of temperature via the app. The chamber, which will have both warming and refrigeration modes, will also have an internal camera to monitor the state of projects. Users will be able to enter and save recipes on the system.

Tommy Leung in front of a HakkoBako chamber

“HakkoBako is building a fermentation chamber that lets chefs create unique and proprietary foods and flavours,” Leung told The Spoon via email. “We are using technology to make the fermentation process easier, faster and with more consistent results.”

According to Leung, the company has developed multiple prototypes that are currently being used by chefs and food developers. They’ve also started to work with a contract manufacturer in China, but the pandemic has made in-person visits to the manufacturer difficult and has put them a little behind schedule on production of the professional unit.

He also told The Spoon via email that they have plans for a home fermentation chamber that they are hoping to launch in the spring of 2021. Targeted at a price point of roughly $200 (versus around $5,000 for the commercial version), the home HakkoBako will allow users to make things like yogurt or kimchi.

Long term, the company also has plans for a fermentation lab that would be a destination for other food innovators. According to a deck Leung provided to the Spoon, the lab will “will provide support, novel ingredients and techniques with on-going testing, recording and development of the chefs recipes.”

The Food Tech Show: What Would a Biden Presidency Look Like for Food Tech?

It’s another Food Tech Show podcast!

The Spoon editorial team got together this week to discuss our favorite stories of the week, including:

  • McDonald’s announced their new plant-based burger, the McPlant, and everyone was confused
  • The Golden Arches also talked about how technology will change the McDonald’s experience in coming years, especially when it comes to drive-thru
  • Boston robot restaurant startup Spyce Kitchen debuted their 2.0 concept and it’s pretty darn different than the first generation. Also different: no dine-in eating.
  • What a Biden presidency could look like when it comes to food tech?

As always, you can find the Food Tech Show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and other places you get can podcasts.

You can also hit play below or download the episode direct to your device.

Building The Next Great Food Tech Company? Apply for the Smart Kitchen Summit Startup Showcase!

Are you working on a new alternative protein product that you think will change the world? Building the cooking appliance or food robot of the future? Have an idea for AI could reduce the amount of food we waste?

If so, you’ll want to apply for the sixth annual Smart Kitchen Summit Startup Showcase!

Alumni of the SKS Startup Showcase have gone on to raise raise tens of millions of dollars in funding, appear on Shark Tank, and make some of the most exciting and well-known products in their categories.

And because North America’s leading food tech summit is going virtual this year, the 2020 Startup Showcase will be a truly global launchpad for your food tech company.

Just submit your application no later than September 15 to enter your company for consideration. We’ll be selecting 10 startups to tell the world about their ideas at the Smart Kitchen Summit from October 13 – 15, 2020.

We look forward to hearing about your company and helping you tell your story to the world!

My Other Phone Is a Restaurant

The surprise hit story on The Spoon this week has been our recent post on Mexico City-based remotekitchen, a startup that’s building a mobile-first restaurant-tech platform that, theoretically at least, only needs a smart phone to operate. 

I highlight this story not because I think every restaurant needs to pare down their tech stack to a smartphone, but because now more than ever, restaurant tech companies need to ensure their products are offering real value to restaurants. In other words, they need to solve problems restaurants are having right now while also helping to prepare for the ones waiting for us in the future.

Remotekitchen’s platform solves some obvious problems for its core audience. Its founders explained to me that 96 percent of independent restaurants in Latin America are not online, that restaurant tech solutions are underdeveloped in the region, and that a vast majority of restaurant owners have to take orders via their own smartphones. The mobile-first approach also better equips operators to run virtual restaurants, which may be necessary depending on how high the coronavirus wave spikes.

The U.S. is not like Latin America when it comes to restaurant tech. We have choice and then some. Prior the pandemic, restaurant tech solutions included not just point of sale systems and self-serve kiosks, but also reservations management, wearable computing, virtual reality on boarding . . . the list goes on and on and on.

I don’t think restaurant tech companies should necessarily stop work on any of the above solutions, so long as they’re somehow helping restaurants solve the industry’s most urgent problems. Such as:

Improving restaurant pickup orders. For restaurants new to the off-premises world, juggling takeout and/or curbside pickup orders has proven challenging — to put it politely. Restaurants need more streamlined ways to both receive and deliver pickup orders to customers. (Geofencing, perhaps?)

Making restaurants more socially distant. I don’t refer to space between tables here. That is not a problem tech needs to solve. Menus, on the other hand, are. The number of simple digital menu solutions out there right now is encouraging, and many of them rely on simple signage or QR codes. And unlike chalkboards or disposable paper menus, digital menus could eventually become interactive tools for guests to learn more about the food they’re eating.

Enabling better communications with customers. This one is huge. Back when the pandemic first hit. I remember one restaurant telling me their customers didn’t even know they were open for takeout. Part of this is due to the rise of third-party delivery, which owns a lot of customer relationships. Delivery integrators are one way around this, as they allow restaurants to offer off-premises while still keeping their customer data.

These are just a few of the hot-button issues in the restaurant biz right now. I’m sure you have others, so drop us a line (tips@thespoon.tech) to let us know where you think restaurant tech will be the most valuable right now.

Restaurant Closures Underscore the Need for Off-Premises

The week, Yelp released new data about COVID-19’s continued impact on businesses, the restaurant industry included. The takeaway? A bunch of restaurants that have temporarily closed may never reopen.

Quite a lot of them, actually. 

As of June 15, roughly 140,000 businesses were listed on Yelp as closed. While retail got hit the hardest, restaurants came in at a close second, with 23,981 businesses closed. And here’s the kicker: more than half — 53 percent — of those restaurants currently closed won’t reopen, according to Yelp. 

“Restaurants run on thin margins and can sometimes take months or even years to break even, resulting in this higher rate of permanent closures,” Yelp explained in its update. 

This is aggravated by the rising number of COVID-19 cases across many states, which is causing governments to either delay reopening or order closures again. Some restaurants that had already reopened have to close once more because of employees becoming infected. 

Right now it’s incredibly hard to predict the total number of restaurants that will close permanently. Yelp’s numbers are actually smaller than a report by Independent Restaurant Coalition that said 85 percent of indie restaurants could close by the end of the year. Still, tens of thousands of restaurants is a lot of restaurants.

The lesson? First, that we’re going to be riding this will they-won’t they wave in terms of restaurant closures for a long time. Second, those that can, must continue finding ways to serve their customers with off-premises orders, even if their dining rooms have partially reopened. 

I’m All-In on Smart Vending Machines for Restaurants

On the note of restaurant tech that’s useful, The Spoon’s Editor recently did a report on the promise of automated vending machines in the foodservice world. I give it a shout out here because these next-generation machines, which serve up actual meals created by real chefs, could be the answer to getting good food in a socially distanced manner in many settings.

Consider the old mall food court, where you could mill between different restaurants and build your own smorgasbord of mediocre mall food. Digitizing as much of these very public spaces as possible will be necessary for sanitization and social distancing in the future. Since next-gen automated vending machines are basically their own little restaurant in a box, it’s possible we’ll one day head to food courts not manned by people but equipped with multiple machines from different brands offering increased choice without so much human interaction.

Given the way this pandemic is heading, smart vending machines could be a really smart idea.

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Talking 23andMe For Farms, Bioreactors-as-a-Service & Other Crazy FoodTech Ideas With Dave Friedberg

But here’s the thing: most ideas about the future sound a little crazy the first time you hear them.

I had known about Friedberg for some time, in part because was the founder and CEO of agtech’s first unicorn in the Climate Corporation, a company that sold to Monsanto in 2013 for over $1 billion.

More recently I’d been tracking his progress at the Production Board, a company that is essentially an idea incubation factory for food, bio and ag tech concepts. The group is run by what Friedberg describes as “operators more than investors”.

The Production Board company portfolio is strung together by something closer to a grand unified theory about how the world should work rather than any sort of single investment theme. This theory, which Friedberg articulates in a manifesto on the Production Board website, reads as much like a science fiction short story as it does an investment guide and is centered around how the world’s existing food and agricultural production systems are antiquated relics of an inefficient industrial production processes that have taken root over the past couple centuries.

I sat down for a (virtual) meeting with Friedberg recently to talk about how the Production Board works and the progress he is making for upending some of the antiquated food and ag systems. We also talk about Friedberg thinks the future of food could look like ten years or more in the future.

You can see some excerpts from our interview below. In order to see the full interview and read a transcript of our conversation, you’ll want to subscribe to Spoon Plus.

Friedberg on how crazy it is we aren’t harnessing the full technology development to address our problems around food and agriculture:

If a Martian came down to planet Earth and they look at the way we’re doing things they would say, “that’s a little bit crazy. Not only that, but it’s crazy that you guys do things the way you do them given all the technology you have. You can do crazy shit as humans. You can like write DNA and you can like ferment things in these tanks and make whatever molecule you want. And you can pretty much print anything anywhere using different chemistry.” It’s ridiculous that the systems of production operate the way that they do.

Friedberg on the idea behind Culture Biosciences, a company he describes as an AWS for Bioreactors:

If you fast forward 50 years, Tyson Foods and these feedlots and cattle grazing, I mean, it’s so fu**ing inefficient it’s just unreal. It’s mind blowing how much energy and money and CO2 is part of the system of producing meat and animal protein. And we have the tools to make animal proteins and fermenters, so if you could have a fermenter in your home, and it just prints meat when you want it, I think that would be pretty cool. Technically the science is there, the engineering isn’t. And that’s the thing: with a lot of these things, the science is proven, but a lot engineering work still to do. But it’s, it’s feasible. All these things are feasible.

Friedberg on how the Production Board germinates ideas that ultimately become one of their portfolio businesses:

We do primary research, we spend a lot of time with scientists and researchers and identify new and emerging breakthroughs in science and technology. We also spend time in the markets we operate in: food, agriculture, human health, increasingly looking at things like energy materials. And then we try and identify what’s a better way of doing this thing in this market?

So using all these new breakthroughs using all this new science, using all this technology that might be emerging, how can we do something that can transform one of these markets and really do a 10x on it? If it’s not a 10x, if it’s just a 5% better model or a 10% better model, it’s not worth doing. If we can 10x the market – reduce cost or energy by 10 times – then it becomes kind of exciting. And so that’s how we kind of think about operating business opportunities.

The full interview and transcript are available for Spoon Plus customers. You can learn more about Spoon Plus here. 

Report: How Microbiome and DNA-based Personalized Nutrition Will Change the Way We Eat (Spoon Plus)

The “first wave” of personalized nutrition is already here. These are companies that use data from wearable devices to track consumers’ weight, exercise quantities, temperature and other factors that can shape food and beverage suggestions.

The next step, or “second wave,” on the evolutionary path of personalized nutrition will get even more granular in terms of the information about each individual that services can pull and analyze. Instead of drawing on data from wearables, third-party companies will use information gathered from inside individual bodies, either from gut microbes or DNA sequences. Using this data, companies will be able to create truly personalized diet plans driven by lab results and deep analysis, instead of the more generalized metrics that are available through wearables. These second-wave services can create meal journeys that are absolutely unique to each individual based not on of general trends or self-reported data but actual biology.

This report will examine the biomarker-driven, personalized nutrition landscape. It will examine key drivers, market players, opportunities and challenges, and make forward-looking predictions about what this market will look like over the next 12 months, 5 years and 10 years.

Companies profiled in this report include Viome, Sun Genomics, Genopalate, DNANudge, DayTwo and Nylos.

This research report is exclusive for Spoon Plus members. You can learn more about Spoon Plus here.

Tovala’s David Rabie on How He Built a Loyal User Base For His Smart Kitchen & Food Delivery Startup

Despite the complexity of building two businesses at once and presenting them as one integrated whole, Tovala’s managed to build a highly loyal user base with what is arguably the highest lifetime user value in the connected kitchen space.

I decided to catch up with Tovala’s CEO David Rabie and ask him how he’s managed to find success while other companies have struggled. 

The interview is an exclusive offering for Spoon Plus members. You can learn more about Spoon Plus here. 

Big Idea Ventures Raising $250M Fund Targeting Later-Stage FoodTech Companies

Big Idea Ventures (BIV), the hybrid VC firm-slash-accelerator, first caught my attention last year when it launched the New Protein Fund, a $50 million fund targeting seed-stage companies in the alternative protein space, and made its first investment in cell-based seafood company Shiok Meats. At the same time, BIV announced a twice-yearly accelerator program for budding alt-protein startups with locations in New York City and Singapore.

Now the accelerator is seeking its second cohort — and BIV is preparing to launch its second fund. Called Generation Food, BIV’s newest fund will target later-stage companies, Series A and beyond. It will expand its focus to tackle sustainability across the food supply chain, not just in the alternative protein space. The target amount? 250 million dollars.

I hopped on a call with Tom Mastrobuoni, a Venture Partner at BIV and the former CFO of Tyson Ventures (which invested in the New Protein Fund), and Andrew Ive, the founder and Managing General Partner of BIV, earlier this week to learn more about Generation Food. Mastrobuoni said that this fund will take a step back to tackle some of the larger, underlying issues plaguing the food system. He named six target areas:

  • Alternative Protein. With the Generation Food fund, BIV will continue to invest in alt-protein. However, they’ll focus on companies that are enabling general growth within the sector instead of particular food brands.
  • Innovative Ingredient Options. Better-for-you ingredients for healthy products including salt and sugar replacements.
  • Breakthrough Manufacturing. Improved manufacturing processes for proteins, as well as more sustainable packaging and low-waste water solutions.
  • Food Safety Innovation. Technologies that are making food safer and last longer, e.g. hyperspectral imaging.
  • Traceability and Transparency. Supply chain enhancements — but not just blockchain, which Mastrobuoni pointed out can be cost-prohibitive.
  • Logistics Enhancement. Ways to get food from A to B more efficiently, without relying so much on old-school methods like trucks.

At the same time, BIV will continue to use its New Protein Fund to fuel the Accelerator program. Thus far BIV has invested in 12 seed-stage companies through its Accelerator Program — which is split between Singapore and New York — and are about to kick off another. Ive said that he plans to start raising for the second New Protein Fund when the current one’s capital is about 75 percent deployed — in two years or so. He also plans to add at least one more cohort location.

Generation Food is a big step up for BIV, both in terms of scope and size. Ive told me that they were inspired to start the fund after speaking with large corporates, many of whom are making significant commitments to shareholders and consumers about how they’ll reduce their environmental impact — be it through packaging, water usage, CO2 emissions, etc. “Large corporates want to make these changes,” Ive told me. “They just don’t necessarily have the technologies in place to deliver on them.”

That’s where BIV can come in. Instead of corporations having to re-engineer their businesses to meet these targets, they can integrate technology from mid-stage companies which will do it for them.

Considering the volatile economic climate right now, it might seem like an odd time to launch a venture fund. But for BIV, COVID-19 is actually proving the relevance of food technology more than ever. “The pandemic is shining a light on the cracks that have always been just under the surface of the food supply chain,” Mastrobuoni told me. With the Generation Food fund, BIV hopes to drive innovation into spaces that can enhance sustainability and make the supply chain more resilient, should something like the coronavirus strike again.

Indeed, one of the things to come out of the COVID-19 pandemic is a heightened awareness around our food — where it comes from, how safe it is, and how inconsistent our supply chain can be (just try to find flour at your grocery store and see what happens). If we want to ensure a more resilient supply chain — especially in case another catastrophe strikes — we have to make our food system more sustainable now.

That’s the kind of argument that could help BIV attract the full $250 million for Generation Food.