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Aleph Farms announces 'significant' clean meat advances

4 May 2018

Clean meat company Aleph Farms is announcing what it believes are two significant advances in the production of clean meat: expanding the composition of the meat itself and growing it in a more structured way.

Clean meat company Aleph Farms is announcing what it believes are two significant advances in the production of clean meat: expanding the composition of the meat itself and growing it in a more structured way.

Until now, the company says, clean meat – animal meat grown in a clean setting rather than in an animal – has often been limited to simple structures of one or two types of cell tissue, limiting its applications to ground meat.

“It has been a major hurdle to mimic meat’s many properties, such as texture, shape, juiciness, and flavor,” said Prof. Shulamit Levenberg, Co-Founder and Chief Scientific Officer of Aleph Farms. “Our use of the four cell types found in conventional cuts of meat, including vascular and connective tissues, is the key to a product that will be closer to the beef that people crave.”

Aleph Farms’ 3D technology relies on creating a complex tissue composed of the four core meat cell types. They are then able to grow these cells on an intricate proprietary three-dimensional platform. Aleph’s clean meat mimics traditional cuts of beef in both structure and texture, but without what the company says is beef’s huge environmental impact, its heavy resource requirements, or its contribution to climate change.

“Consumers – especially millennials and flexitarians – care about animal welfare and the environment,” said Didier Toubia, Co-Founder and CEO of Aleph Farms. “At the same time, they want to eat juicy, indulgent steak – not just ‘protein.’ Our goal is to help these consumers adhere to their personal standards, while getting to enjoy safe, sustainable meat.”

“GFI’s objective is to help leading scientists and entrepreneurs apply their expertise to clean meat development,” said Bruce Friedrich, Executive Director of The Good Food Institute (GFI), a non-profit promoting the clean meat industry. “Israel’s start-up mindset allows the team at Aleph to leverage this rich history and technological leadership to create breakthroughs in clean meat. Aleph Farms’ advantages are its strong R&D capabilities, academic collaborations, and experienced team. These give the company a significant leg up.”

Aleph Farms (previously Meat-the-Future) was co-founded in 2017 by Israeli food-tech incubator The Kitchen, a part of the Strauss Group, and the Technion. The company is supported by US and European venture capital firms.