Forsea Foods, a Rehovot, Israel-based company that use organoid technology for culturing seafood products, raised USD5.2m in Seed funding.
The round was led by Target Global, with participation from The Kitchen FoodTech Hub, PeakBridge VC, Zora Ventures, FoodHack, and Milk & Honey Ventures.
The company intends to use the funds to grow cultivated eel meat, high in demand for kabayaki and sushi.
Founded by Roee Nir, Iftach Nachman, and Yaniv Elkouby, Forsea Foods is dedicated to preserving the fish population by creating a viable alternative to wild-caught seafood and leaving the fragile marine ecosystem completely untouched. The organoid approach to cultivating fish tissue involves creating an ideal environment for fish cells to spontaneously form their natural composition of native fat and muscle. They grow as a three-dimensional tissue structure, just like, they would grow in a nature. This technology bypasses the scaffolding stage and requires fewer bioreactors. It also reduces the amount of expensive growth factors required, making the final product more affordable.
Forsea utilizes a non-GMO organoid platform in which the eel meat is grown ex vivo as a three-dimensional tissue structure in the same manner it would grow in a living fish. This technology bypasses the scaffolding stage and requires fewer bioreactors.
Forsea will inaugurate its pilot plant during 2023. The plant will allow the company to create a preliminary design for a large-scale alpha production system, and to launch the company’s first products. The startup will invest the newly raised capital to accelerate R&D for both growing eel meat and developing the process for other fish species. Forsea also will improve and expand its core technology to enable organoid growth in large-scale bioreactors, while developing methods to increase production yield and profitability at a lower cost. These include perfecting a continuous feeding strategy and nutritional support. Recently Forsea expanded its R&D team and activities to Rehovot, in the heart of Israel’s FoodTech valley.
FinSMEs
26/10/2022