🥩 Is Meati Back from the Brink?

Next week the HackSummit brings together hundreds of frontrunners in Food and Agriculture, as well as innovators, investors and operators across the entire Climate Deep Tech landscape. It’s set to be a 2025 highlight and a sell-out, that’s for sure.

If you’ve got your ticket, then we can’t wait to see you there.

And speaking of HackSummit, we’re looking ahead to 2026 and there’s one big question we’ve been asking here at Hack HQ. And now we’d love to ask you.

*When we say a FoodHack edition of the HackSummit, we’re talking 100% Founders, Funders, and all those committed to investing in and accelerating the future of Food and Agriculture.

This week in FoodTech:

🔒 Alt dairy ingredient startup closes down
💸 $100M debt financing for Beyond Meat
☕️ Beanless coffee and cocoa platform

The Digest

📉 What’s down? Mycelium protein company Meati Foods, once valued at $650 million and backed by $450 million in funding, is set to be sold for just $4 million following a severe financial collapse.

• Here’s two cents from a FoodTech Founder, go-to market strategist and investor.

🔐 Closing down. Belgian food tech Bolder Foods, the company behind mycelium-based dairy alternative MycoVeg, has shut down after failing to secure funding. Read the goodbye.

🔍 The Climate Bonds Initiative launched the world’s first certification criteria for alternative proteins to help mobilise climate-focused investment into sustainable meat and dairy alternatives, aiming to scale the sector amid growing demand and declining investor confidence.

🇮🇳 The UK has signed a landmark free trade agreement with India, cutting tariffs on key food and drink exports like whisky, chocolate, soft drinks, and lamb, in a deal expected to boost UK exports, create jobs, and strengthen economic ties.

🎧 Good listen: This week’s Another Climate Tech podcast features Nemailla Bonturi, co-founder of ÄIO, and a discussion on yeast-made fats, circular innovation, and croissants that could fight climate change.

New in Fundraising

💰 Beyond Meat reported a 9% year-on-year revenue decline in Q1 2025, citing macroeconomic pressures and reduced consumer confidence, while securing $100 million in debt financing to bolster liquidity and support its strategic growth plans.

🥤 US-based functional probiotic soda startup Culture Pop Soda raised $15 million from existing investors to support expanded distribution and marketing as it prepares for a national push in 2025.

💸 Sennos, formerly Precision Fermentation and based in the US, secured $15 million to scale its real-time fermentation analytics and AI platform across the brewing industry and expand into sectors like biofuels and alternative proteins, leveraging the world’s largest fermentation data set to boost efficiency, consistency, and sustainability.

🥛 Finland-based food technology innovator, Foodiq has raised €10 million in equity funding to accelerate its international expansion, disrupt the global dairy industry and scale up its breakthrough MLC technology.

🧑‍🍳 Posha has developed a $1,750 countertop cooking robot that uses computer vision to automate home-cooked meals with customisable recipes. It just raised $8 million to expand its AI capabilities and recipe offerings after selling out its first product batch.

💡 Uviquity emerged from stealth with $6.6 million in seed funding. It is developing solid-state far-UVC light chips for safe, scalable pathogen control across industries, and will use the funds to advance its semiconductor platform and prepare for commercialisation.

🥐 Flings, a Canadian startup offering high-protein, low-sugar nostalgic toaster pastries, raised $2.3 million seed funding to expand its product line and US retail presence.

🥙 London-based Platter secured €411,000 pre-seed funding to scale its B2B wholesale food platform streamlining connections between suppliers and buyers, designed to reduce food waste and inefficiencies in Europe’s €112 billion food industry.

🇪🇪 Estonian agtech company eAgronom secured investment from Mondelēz International’s Sustainable Futures platform. It will use the funds to expand its digital tools and sustainability impact as it supports farmers in their transition to regenerative agriculture across over 4 million hectares of European farmland by 2026.

New in Startups

☕️ Compound Foods launched a beanless coffee and cocoa platform made from upcycled ingredients to offer sustainable, scalable alternatives to traditional crops, aiming to reduce supply chain risks and environmental impact.

🚀 MOA Foodtech debuted Albatros, the world’s first AI-powered microbiology platform that accelerates fermentation-based product development by up to 75%, enabling manufacturers to upcycle byproducts into high-value ingredients more sustainably and cost-effectively.

🧫 Multus launched the world’s first food-grade DMEM/F12-FG basal media, transforming a 70-year-old cell culture formulation into a scalable, affordable, and regulatory-compliant solution for cultivated meat production through AI and industry partnerships. Watch a message fro the CEO.

🤝 Liberation Labs has partnered with Dutch startup Vivici to produce its precision-fermented whey protein, Vivitein, at a new biomanufacturing facility in Indiana starting next year.

🇸🇬 New biotech platform Turion Labs launched in Singapore with plans to build Southeast Asia’s first full-stack biotech innovation network, offering lab infrastructure, CRO services, and regulatory support to help early-stage biotech startups scale from R&D to commercialisation.

🍿 Khloé Kardashian launched Khloud Protein Popcorn, a non-GMO, gluten-free snack made with whole grain corn and a milk protein-based seasoning blend, offering 7 grams of protein per serving.

🥝 US-based Hiya Health debuted Kids Daily Hydration, a sugar-free powdered drink mix made with fruits, electrolytes, and nutrients to support children’s hydration and wellness.

Plant Based

🧈 French luxury pastry brand Maison Linotte, launched Purely, an organic, plant-based butter alternative designed as a 1:1 replacement for dairy butter, free from palm oil, additives, and major allergens, and aimed at both chefs and home bakers.

🇨🇭 Switzerland’s Federal Supreme Court has ruled that plant-based meat products can no longer use animal names like “chicken” or “beef” on packaging to avoid consumer confusion—despite evidence suggesting most consumers already recognise such products as plant-based. Here’s what the verdict means for Planted.

🇫🇷 Five French plant-based food companies—Hari&Co, Accro, HappyVore, La Vie, and Swap Food—have joined forces to create ‘France’s first’ plant-based food coalition, InterVeg, dedicated to advancing sustainable, healthy, and sovereign food through regulatory advocacy and public engagement.

🍗 Restaurant chain Malak Al Tawouk has partnered with UAE-based Switch Foods to launch the region’s first plant-based chicken shawarma in Dubai, introducing a new fast-casual menu featuring pea protein-based meat alternatives that are soy-, gluten-, and allergen-free.

Big Food

🐷 In a landmark decision, the FDA has approved gene-edited pigs developed by PIC for human consumption, marking a major breakthrough in livestock biotechnology by enabling commercial production of PRRS-resistant pigs that promise to improve animal welfare, reduce industry losses, and enhance sustainability in pork production.

🚲 Deliveroo has agreed to be acquired by US-based DoorDash for £2.4 billion, marking a major consolidation in the global food delivery market.

From the Community

Get hired in FoodTech

• Meatable (Netherlands) are hiring a Head of Regulatory Affairs

• Rebellyous Foods (USA) is hiring a Head of Operations

• Mewery (Czech Republic) is looking for 5 scientists

👋 Join us at a FoodHack Meetup in Boston, Copenhagen, Basel and Berlin. Sign up here.

💡 6 APAC startups turning microbes into Climate solutions.

🥩 Take a look inside Juicy Marbles’ pitch deck.

🚦 Just for fun: What do traffic jams and founders have in common? 4 answers here

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Until next time - Stay Hungry