🧀 The €30 million case for animal-free casein

We’ve scoured the globe, and the FoodTech World Cup Semi Finalists are officially in!

This year’s lineup spans cocoa without farms, fruit without trees, sound-powered fermentation, and ingredients engineered at the nano and cellular level.

What stands out from over 160 applications is the rise of science-first founders, platform technologies, and a clear shift toward functionality and scalability.

It’s time to meet the 12 semi-finalists, spanning six regions.

Next stop: Lausanne - where the finalists pitch live at the HackSummit this April. Come and watch.

This week in FoodTech:

💸 Create Wellness raises $20M for plant-based creatine
🥕 Afreshed acquires Etepetete to scale ugly produce logistics
👩🏻‍⚖ Why Impossible Foods is on the naughty step

The Digest

🇪🇺 Good Read: Ahead of HackSummit, April 22-23, we caught up with Sifted to share how Europe’s deeptech edge could become a global advantage if the region can better translate innovation into scalable, commercial success. 

📈 What’s up? Helios AI warns that Persian Gulf fertiliser disruptions could drive global food prices up 12–18% by the end of 2026.

🥛 Mississippi has passed legislation banning the sale of lab-grown dairy products, including cell-cultured milk, becoming the first US state to extend cultivated meat restrictions to dairy.

🤩 The world's largest food and beverage company, Nestlé, has joined FoodHack as a Board Member to help accelerate and scale the next generation of food startups.

New in Funding

🇫🇷 French precision fermentation company Standing Ovation raised €30 million in a Series B funding round backed by investors including Bpifrance, Crédit Mutuel Innovation, Bel Group, Danone Ventures and Astanor. It will use the funds to scale commercial rollout of its animal-free casein and expand into global markets.

💊 New York-based Create Wellness secured $20 million Series B funding in a round led by Alliance Consumer Growth, with participation from Impact Capital and Unilever Ventures, to expand its plant-based creatine-based supplements.

🇳🇱 The Dutch Research Council awarded €4.1 million to three cellular agriculture projects under the National Growth Fund programme to advance cultivated meat and precision fermentation technologies, with the funding aimed at scaling production and reducing costs.

🤖 Germany’s Nature Robots raised €4 million seed funding from Climentum Capital, Bayern Kapital and Planetary Impact Ventures to tackle agriculture’s “triple threat” of labour shortages, rising costs and environmental pressures with AI-powered software for autonomous machinery.

🍐 Austrian startup Afreshed has acquired German rival Etepetete to consolidate the “ugly produce” food waste market in the DACH region, alongside securing a mid-seven-figure investment from Raiffeisen-Holding Niederösterreich-Wien to fund its expansion into Germany and further develop its tech-driven logistics and route-optimisation platform.

🥕 Netherlands-based Mill Republic raised a pre-seed funding round backed by Planetary Impact Ventures and Rotterdam de boer op! to scale its decentralised grain processing platform, designed to enable small-scale farmers to mill grains locally, assess quality and connect directly with buyers.

💻 Foovi secured investment from Rockstart AgriFood Fund II to scale its software platform that connects food producers and buyers to improve local market access and pricing.

New in Startups

✅ Australia’s All G received FDA “no questions” GRAS approval for its cow-free lactoferrin protein, produced using microbial fermentation, accelerating its market entry across food, beverage and nutrition applications.

Plant-Based

👎🏼 Switzerland’s Federal Supreme Court ruled that Danone cannot use the term “milk” in marketing its Alpro plant-based products, even in modified phrases like “This Is Not M*lk”.

👩🏻‍⚖ Impossible Foods lost a trademark lawsuit to influencer Joel Runyon’s Impossible HQ after a California jury found it had wilfully infringed existing “Impossible” trademarks, ordering it to pay $3.25 million in damages following a years-long legal dispute over brand name rights.

🌱 Schouten Europe unveiled a plant-based fillet made using proprietary fibre technology to create a meat-like texture with reduced processing and up to 10–30% lower environmental impact.

🍵 Oatly has expanded its ready-to-drink portfolio with a new plant-based Strawberry Matcha Latte.

Big Food

🤝🏼 Nestlé has partnered with the United Nations University to launch the World Food Academy for Sustainable Food Systems, a global education platform aimed at training young professionals, particularly in the Global South, to help accelerate the transition to more sustainable and resilient food systems

💵 McCormick & Company has agreed to combine with Unilever’s food business in a deal worth $44.8–65 billion to create a global flavour and food giant, with the transaction aimed at driving scale, cost synergies and growth.

From the Community

🏆 Forward Fooding officially launched its 2025 FoodTech 500 list. Explore the full ranking here.

🥚 April Fool’s: Calling all protein lovers: Has Tesco launched a giant boiled egg? And the idea behind Protein Cigarettes.

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Until next time - Stay Hungry