Manufacturing Meat without the animals.
Congrats to Memphis Meats on building quite the industry consortium, with the two of largest meat customers in America as investors — Tyson and Cargill.
We knew of their keen interest when we led the Series A, but the full syndicate announcement came today. From Forbes:
“For the first time, we’re replacing meat with meat – not a meat alternative. That gets Tyson and Cargill enormously excited because they’re in the meat business. There’s the potential to transform feeding the world as we know it,” says Valeti (founder and CEO). He first thought about growing meat without animals after his cardiology fellowship at Mayo Clinic in 2005 where he observed a clinical trial that successfully rebuilt damaged heart tissue with stem cells.
Memphis Meats is trying to figure out a way to increase protein production globally to meet demand from 10 billion global citizens by 2050 without exacerbating limited resources for farmland and livestock. Valeti estimates demand for meat will double in the next 30 years.
“If disruptions take place in the way that food is going to be developed or delivered in protein, in particular, Tyson Foods is going to be there,” Justin Whitmore, head of Tyson Ventures, told Forbes.
A meat giant like Tyson, which sells about $30 billion a year of beef, poultry and pork, can help advise Memphis Meats on how to scale up. “We want to work with them to scale. Cost is the main focus for us,” Memphis Meats CEO and cofounder Uma Valeti told Forbes. “At the end point, it will be significantly cheaper than conventional meat.” Agribusiness conglomerate Cargill, the second-largest beef producer in the world, also invested in Memphis Meats
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