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The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

Funding

RIND Raises $6.1M for Upcycled Fruit Snacks

RIND Snacks, a startup that produces upcycled dried fruit snacks, this week announced that it has raised $6.1 million in a Series A round of funding (news from Forbes). This round was led by Valor Siren Ventures, with participation from an existing investor, Melitas Ventures. This brings the company’s total funding to $8.4 million. This most recent round of funding will be used to increase production capacity and expand RIND’s team.

RIND’s chewy dried fruit snacks are made from fruit that would have otherwise be wasted and wind up in the landfill. The peels of the fruits are left on, which are also typically discarded. The company estimates that it has prevented about 120,000 pounds of edible fruit peels from being discarded in 2020. Later this year, RIND will also be launching crunchy dried fruit chips and the company has also hinted at making roasted vegetable snacks (including the peel) in the future.

Towards the end of 2020, Whole Foods made predictions for food trends of 2021, and one of the trends happened to be upcycled foods. A few other companies make use of discarded fruit to create new products, including the Ugly Company and 2050 Company. In April, the “Upcycled Certified” label was officially launched by the Upcycled Food Association to help consumers pick out products from companies like these that are focused on reducing food waste.

RIND’s snacks are available for purchase on the company’s website, and in over 3,000 retail locations throughout the U.S., including Whole Foods, Wegmans, Meijers, and CVS. The company has also partnered with food delivery services like HungryRoot and Imperfect Foods.

Horizon Europe Allocates €32M for Sustainable Protein Research

Horizon Europe, a European Union funding program for research and innovation, announced today that it has €32 million in funding available for research into more sustainable protein options such as cultivated meat and plant-based alternatives. The program works to achieve the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, and this is the largest funding package set aside specifically for sustainable proteins to date.

There are three project categories supported by Horizon Europe’s funding for researchers to take on:

  1. Fill in the gaps of nutrition, safety, and allergenicity of alternative proteins, and then assessing the environmental footprints of these products. Budget – €11 million.
  2. Develop sustainable protein crop systems and value chains with the facilitation of best practices between farmers
    Budget – €9 million
  3. Focus on food environments and aim to ensure that consumers are able to make healthy and sustainable food choices when at restaurants and supermarkets. Budget – €12 million

Food security is a global issue because of a continuously expanding population and climate change. By 2050, it is estimated that 9.7 billion people will inhabit the planet, yet the resources and land available for food production on Earth are finite. To feed this many people, we would have to double the current amount of food production. According to the Good Food Institute, plant-based meat alternatives use 47-99 percent less land than conventional meat. The same report by GFI stated that 77 percent of all available agricultural land is used for animal agriculture, yet animal agriculture only supplies 17 percent of the world’s food supply. This type of inefficiency would make it challenging to achieve the food requirements needed by 2050.

The Good Food Institute Europe, along with 21 other organizations, sent a letter to the European Commission imploring them to consider allocating funding for the research and development of more sustainable proteins. This isn’t the first time governments have stepped up to provide funding for this type of research. The Spanish government granted BioTech Foods €5.2 million ($6.3 million USD) at the beginning of 2021 for the company’s cultured meat project, which consisted of investigating the health benefits of cultured meat. NovaMeat also received €250,000 (~ $307,500 USD) in funding from the Spanish government, at the beginning of the year to further develop its 3D printed meat alternatives. In the U.S., UC Davis received a $3.5 million grant from the National Science Foundation to research cultivated meat last September.

The Horizon Europe program will run until 2027, and those interested in applying for grant money through Horizon Europe for these three projects can apply here.

Float Foods Secures $2.2M for Alternative Whole Egg Product

Singapore-based Float Foods, which produces whole plant-based eggs, announced today that it has raised $2.2 million SGD (~$1.66 million USD). This round of funding was led by both DSG Consumer Partners and Insignia Ventures, with participation from Teja Ventures Apricot Capital, Baksh Capital, Agrocorp Ventures, Water Tiger Investments, and Ebb & Flow. In addition to this recent round, Float Foods previously raised an undisclosed amount of capital through a grant from the Temasek Foundation in March of this year.

The startup’s proprietary product is called OnlyEg, which is made from a base of legumes. The alternative egg contains both a yellow yolk and the whites like a regular egg, allowing it to function much like a regular egg in various applications.

One common concern with alternative protein products is that they do not have the same nutritional value as their animal counterpart. This can sometimes be true, however, Float Foods claims that its alternative egg contains as many vitamins and minerals as a chicken egg. The company also said it is improving upon the nutritional content of its OnlyEg before it launches.

There are not many other whole plant-based eggs on the market, and Float Foods mainly faces competition from companies making alternative eggs in liquid form. However, there is a company based in Singapore called OsomeFoods that recently launched an alternative whole, hardboiled egg product made from mycoprotein. Eat Just is building a factory in Singapore to expand availability of its liquid egg product throughout Asia.

OnlyEg is not yet available on the market, and Float Foods said that the product will likely launch next year. In addition to the alternative whole egg product, the company is also developing plant-based egg patties and shreds.

Alternative Meat Start-up Hooray Foods Raises $2M in Seed Round

Plant-based meat company Hooray Foods announced today that it has raised $2 million for its seed round, bringing the company’s total funding to date around $4 million. This round was led by Evolution VC Partners, and also saw participation from Gaingels and Sand Hill Angels.

Hooray Foods’ only product at the moment is plant-based bacon, which is made from a combination of coconut oil, rice flour, tapioca starch, liquid smoke, umami seasoning, maple syrup, salt, and beet juice concentrate. The fat content of the bacon is 20 percent due to Hooray Foods’ encapsulation process, which can help provide a juicer texture to alternative meat products by emulating the richness and fatty texture of real bacon and other meats.

This new capital will be put towards developing additional alternative meat products, as well as improving its existing alternative bacon. The company will also scale its production capacity to expand its products into retail and grocery chains throughout the country.

Ethics, environmental concerns, or health risks are a few reasons someone might have the desire to drop bacon and replace it with a plant-based alternative. Bacon is a processed meat that contains nitrates which have been shown to increase one’s risk of certain cancers and diabetes. Pork has higher carbon emissions compared to plant-based ingredients, and pigs may live in unsanitary and unethical conditions.

Prime Roots is another startup that makes plant-based bacon, but uses mycelium as its main ingredient. I recently tried Prime Root’s new bacon flavors (maple, black pepper, and sriracha) and can attest that it is delicious. THIS, based in the UK, makes plant-based bacon (as well as other meat alternatives) from pea protein and soy.

Last year in November, Hooray Foods launched in 300 Whole Foods across the U.S., and continues to expand to more locations. In addition to Whole Foods, the company’s plant-based bacon can be found in some independent retailers, vegan markets, and small cafes in San Francisco.

Shef Raises $20M for Home Cooked Meal Delivery

Shef, a startup that enables home cooks to sell their food for delivery, announced today that it has raised a $20 million Series A round of funding. The round was led by Andreessen Horowitz with participation from Craft Ventures, Y Combinator, Pioneer Fund, M13 and a bunch of celebrities including Padma Lakshmi, Tiffany Haddish, Katy Perry, Orlando Bloom, chef Aarón Sánchez and NBA player Andre Iguodala. This brings the total amount raised by Shef to $28.8 million.

Currently available in seven markets, including the San Francisco Bay Area, New York, Seattle, Chicago, Houston, and Austin, Shef’s online platform is a marketplace of independent cooks and chefs who either make meals out of their home or in a commercial kitchen. Shef has a rigorous application process that includes a food safety exam, food quality assessment, as well as standard sanitation practices such as hairnets and gloves.

Customers plug in their zip code on Shef’s website to peruse cuisine and cook options available in their area. Shef, however, doesn’t facilitate on-demand, hot food delivery. Meals must be ordered two days in advance and arrive cold for people to re-heat at home, so the service is more akin to a meal planning-type service. Since the cooks on Shef’s platform aren’t professional restauranteurs, this type of advanced ordering system allows them to better prepare inventories and schedules, rather than trying to anticipate demand on any given night. The advanced ordering also makes it easier for Shef to facilitate deliveries.

The legality of selling home cooked meals is still a bit of a grey area from state to state. In 2018, California signed AB-626 into law, making it legal to start a home-based food business in the state. Alvin Salehi, co-founder and co-CEO at Shef told me by video chat last week that there were 44 home cooking bills introduced during the last legistlative session across 29 different states. As part of today’s news, Shef also announced that it has hired Danielle Merida as its general counsel to collaborate with policy makers and advocate for the expansion of home cooking laws across the US.

The home cooking space has been relatively quiet since DishDivvy launched its service in California in 2018, but perhaps the pandemic will shift activity in the sector. The allure of the side hustle plus a reluctance to go back to an office could spur a wave of would-be cooking entrepreneurs to make meals out of their kitchen. Salehi said that the waitlist to be a cook on Shef swelled to more than 12,000 people.

Shef says that more than 85 percent of the cooks on its platform identify as a person of color. With its new funding, Shef will expand both the number of cooks on its platform, as well as the number of cities it serves.

Oceanium Raises £2M to Turn Seaweed into Food and Packaging

UK-based seaweed processing startup Oceanium announced today the first close of a Seed II Round of funding worth approximately £2 million ($2.7M USD). The round was led by Green Angel Syndicate with World Wildlife Fund. This round of funding follows a previous undisclosed investment from venture capital firms Katapult Ocean and Sky Ocean Ventures, as well as Scottish Enterprise.

Oceanium refines sustainably grown seaweed to produce a number of products that range from home-compostable packaging materials to food ingredients including protein, fibre and nutraceuticals. These products are still under development and will be sold under the brand names Ocean Actives, Ocean Health, and Ocean Ware. The first line of Ocean Active nutraceuticals is projected to launch in Q4 of this year.

Oceanium is among a host of startups repurposing seaweed into new foods and materials. Loliware makes plastic-like straws out of seaweed. New Wave Foods makes a plant-based shrimp out of ingredients including seaweed. And AKUA makes a plant-based jerky out of seaweed.

It’s not hard to understand why seaweed is suddenly a hot ingredient for eco-conscious startups. According to Oceanium’s website, using seaweed as a base ingredient for its products has a number of environmental benefits including absorption of CO2 from the air and Nitrogren from the sea, as well as seabed protection and zero need for land or fresh water to grow.

Oceanium says that it will use the new funds to scale its biorefinery and processing model to “open up the market” for sustainable seaweed farming.


Daring Secures $40M in Series B Round for Plant-Based Chicken

Daring, which makes realistic plant-based chicken analogues, this week announced a $40 million Series B funding round. According to a press release sent to The Spoon, D1 Capital Partners led this round, with participation from Maveron, Palm Tree Crew, and the Canadian rapper Drake.

Daring said it will use this most recent funding round to triple the size of its team. Additionally, the company will grow its presence in foodservice and retail channels, as well as focus on product development.

The main ingredients in Daring’s alternative chicken pieces are quite simple: water, soy protein concentrate, and a variety of spices and herbs depending on the flavor. Due to the use of soy, the product boasts 13 grams of protein in one serving. Currently, Daring chicken pieces come in four flavors: lemon & herb, cajun, breaded, and original.

The U.S. is the largest producer of poultry and the second-largest exporter of poultry in the world. Americans also consume more poultry than beef, pork, and other meats. But with veganism continuously on the rise in the U.S., there will be an increasing demand for plant-based chicken products.

Several other startups in the U.S. are focused on crafting plant-based chicken products. Nowadays, a newer start-up, recently raised $2 million in a pre-seed round of funding for its plant-based chicken nuggets. Nuggs also makes chicken nuggets, but announced last year it would also focus on creating alternative hot dogs. Rebellyous originally began with its only product being chicken nuggets, but has expanded its product line to include alternative chicken patties and tenders. Besides these startups, there are also large players like Gardein and Quorn that offer a variety of alternative chicken products.

Towards the end of last year, Daring raised $8 million in its Series A round, and used this capital to expand to 1,000 more retailers in the U.S., including Sprouts, Costco, Wegmans, and Kroger. Online, Daring’s products can be purchased on its website and via Imperfect Foods. The company plans on expanding to more retailers in the upcoming months.

Forager Raises $4M for Local Food Procurement Platform

Forager, a digital platform that grocers and food retailers can use to easily source local food, announced this week that it has raised $4 million. This funding round was led by Duncan Saville of ICM Limited and Coastal Enterprises Inc., with participation from other private investors.

For a food retailer, connecting with hundreds of local farmers, fishers, ranchers, and artisanal producers can be an arduous process. This is where Forager comes in handy; rather than a grocer having to deal with each local producer individually, Forager’s platform lists available local producers and their products in one place. This allows local farms and such to update their inventory on-demand with a phone or computer, and buyers from grocery stores can immediately see the amount of stock available and price of each product.

Forager’s new capital will be used to expand key product features, further develop sales channels, and incorporate upgrades to their product. Towards the end of last year, the company announced that it had partnered with Roche Bros. supermarkets to be used in 20 of its locations and subsidiaries in the Boston Metro area.

Eating food that has traveled shorter distances typically tastes better, helps support a farmer in your community, and is more resilient to supply change disruptions. With all of these benefits, it makes sense that the demand for local food has spiked has spiked, and why more companies in the food tech space are catering to this. Cropswap launched at the start of the pandemic in 2020, with its app connecting consumers to local farmers in their area. Grubmarket, a virtual farmer’s market, raised $60 million in October of last year. Chipotle launched a virtual farmers market last summer to give its customers the opportunity to source food from its ingredients suppliers.

As Forager continues to expand, hopefully local food will become more of the norm in standard grocery stores. To date, Forager has sourced over 200,000 local products through its platform, and currently operates in 12 states with more than 40 grocers and retailers.

Food Tech News: Powdered Oat Milk, Vietnamese Coffee Pour-Over Kits

Welcome to the weekend, the peak of spring, and your favorite place to catch up on food tech news. A few stories caught our eyes this week including China’s recently passed food waste law, new high-protein sesame seeds, Copper Cow Coffee’s latest funding round, and oat milk in the form of powder.

Copper Cow Coffee secures $8.5M in Series A funding round

Copper Cow Coffee produces Vietnamese coffee pour-over kits, and this week the women-owned company raised $8.5 million in funding that will be used for expanding distribution and product innovation. The round was led by Cultivian Sandbox and Arborview Capital and saw participation from Siddhi Capital, Silverton Partners, Social Starts, Montage Ventures, CRCM, and Stormbreaker Ventures. Copper Cow Coffee sources its coffee from farms in Vietnam that apply organic agricultural and processing practices. The company’s pour-over kits include condensed milk or coconut milk creamer packets and Vietnamese coffee, with flavor varieties including vanilla latte, churro, rose, and vanilla. The pour-over kits require no special equipment because the coffee bags fit over the rim of any mug or cup (as depicted above).

Photo by Diego Morales on Unsplash

High-protein sesame seeds for plant-based alternatives

Equinom, a seed-breeding technology company, has partnered with Dipasa, a sesame seed processor and exporter, to develop a high protein sesame seed for use in plant-based protein alternatives. The new sesame seed will be bred using Equinom’s AI-backed genomic optimization algorithms and distributed globally by Dipasa. Sesame seeds do not naturally have a high protein content like soy or wheat does, but the new high-protein sesame seed will contain 65 to 70 percent protein content (a normal sesame seed has a 23 percent protein content). Boosting the protein content of a sesame seed will make it a more viable option as a base for plant-based products.

Photo from Blue Farm’s website

Blue Farm aims to make oat milk more sustainable

Berlin-based Blue Farm has created a powdered oat milk base with the intention of making the plant-based milk sector more sustainable. Transporting liquid-filled cartons across the country, or even globally, releases transportation emissions. On top of this, many plant-based milk cartons are not recyclable. Blue Farm’s oat milk powder comes in a compact, 100% recycled plastic packaging which can be recycled again. The oat milk powder is shelf-stable, and simply must be shaken with water to create liquid oat milk.

Something Better Foods Receives $500K Investment from ICA

Oakland, California-based Something Better Foods, a producer of various plant-based meat and seafood alternatives, raised $500,000 this week through ICA, a nonprofit venture capital fund. Something Better Foods aims to make plant-based foods more accessible to people of color, and ICA’s goal is to “…accelerate great businesses through mentoring and investments to close the racial and gender wealth gaps.”

Better Chew is Something Better Food’s brand, and its product line includes plant-based chicken patties, meatballs, fried chicken, steak, fried fish, chicken nuggets, breakfast sausage patties, and chicken patties. The company uses an undisclosed proprietary process to replicate the taste, texture, and look of meat. Better Food is focused on distributing its products through direct-to-consumer channels and foodservice outlets. One thing that sets Something Better Foods apart from other plant-based meat companies is that it has chosen to incorporate both equity and representation into its business model.

Healthy food and veganism movements often leave out marginalized communities, and this is a huge issue that both Something Better Foods and ICA are trying to offer solutions to. Low-income neighborhoods in the U.S. often only have immediate access to fast-food chains and convenience stores, and about 2.3 million people in the U.S. live in a food desert. Even if someone living in one of these communities wanted to eat healthy, fresh foods or try a plant-based diet, it would be incredibly challenging to access these foods.

This initial round of funding will be used to expand Something Better Foods’ operations and offer additional employment opportunities in the company’s local community. Something Better Foods’ is ICA’s most recent portfolio company and the venture capital fund has so far placed $1.5 million in growth equity to Bay Area companies, focusing on companies founded by entrepreneurs of color and women.

Egypt: Grocery Delivery Service Appetito Raises $450K Seed Round

Cairo-based grocery delivery service Appetito has raised a $450,000 Seed round of funding, reports Business Africa Online. Ahmed Al Alola and a group of Saudi Angel investors led the round along with Afropreneurs Fund, with participation from Jeda Capital.

Formed in March of 2020, Appetito originally started out with a chain of delivery-only (or “dark”) grocery stores that offered next-day and pre-scheduled grocery delivery service. The company recently pivoted to a more on-demand model, offering delivery of 1,000 SKUs in 60 minutes or less to certain parts of Cairo.

Appetito’s funding is the first we’ve covered for an Africa-based grocery startup this year, but it is certainly part of a larger trend we’ve been following. Grocery-related startups (grocery delivery in particular) are hot with investors all over the world right now.

In Europe, Gorillas, Getir, and Glovo have each raised nine-digit funding rounds for their particular fast grocery delivery services. In the U.S. goPuff raised $1.5 billion to scale out its chain of dark convenience stores. And in China, grocery app Xingsheng Youxuan raised $2 billion and Nice Tuan raised $750 million

A big reason for the boost in grocery app funding is the global pandemic, which pushed a record number of people into grocery e-commerce. With various lockdowns enforced in different parts of the world throughout 2020, people limited trips outside their homes. Grocery apps and delivery services became a way to help cut down on human-to-human interaction when getting food.

As vaccinations continue to roll out in different countries, We will have to wait and see if consumers keep up with the online grocery or return once again to stores in-person. One thing is for sure, post-pandemic, there will be a lot more grocery delivery options for people than ever before.

For its part, Appetito said it will use its new funding to expand across Egypt and beyond.

Territory Foods Raises $22M for its Chef-Created Prepared Meal Subscription Service

Territory Foods, a marketplace where local restaurants can sell their meals for delivery via subscription, announced yesterday that it has raised a $22 million Series B round of funding. The round was led by U.S. Venture Partners, with participation from Upfront Ventures, Lewis & Clark Ventures, DF Enterprises, S2G Ventures, Gaingles, Middleland Capital, Finistere Ventures and Rethink Food Capital. This brings the total amount of funding raised by the company to $44 million.

Territory is a different from other fresh meal delivery services in that it partners with and sells meals from local chefs and restaurants as a weekly subscription. So instead of going to a restaurant once or twice a week, a customer can choose to order a number of meals in advance. The meals arrived prepared and packaged up, so they only need to be re-heated, adding to the convenience factor.

The company’s subscription service really became important during the pandemic last year, as restaurants were forced to close their dine-in operations. Territory offered those restaurants and chefs an added revenue stream by creating and assisting with this D2C shipping channel. The chefs and restaurants make the meals and Territory takes care of all the logistics like ordering, packaging and delivery. Not only could Territory provide more orders, but those orders were also frontloaded and batched. This smoothed out revenue volatility from night to night and gave chefs more time to prepare.

In addition to creating another sales channel for chefs and restaurants, Territory can also extend their geographic reach. A San Francisco restaurant may only deliver hot meals to certain neighborhoods, but Territory can delivered the packaged versions meals more widely throughout the Bay Area.

As we come out of the pandemic, one has to wonder what will happen to prepared meal delivery services like Territory Foods and Freshly (which was acquired by Nestlé). With the ability to once again eat out at restaurants — and with other people — will consumers still want to order a week’s worth of prepared meals? Or have they gotten so hooked on prepared meal delivery that they won’t let their subscription go? We’re about to find out.

Territory already serves 20 markets across the U.S. including Miami, Los Angeles and Washington D.C. The company told Crunchbase News that it will use its new funding to expand into new cities as well as invest in technology and food as medicine initiatives.