Upside Foods (formerly known as Memphis Meats) is a food technology company headquartered in

Berkeley, California Berkeley ( ) is a city on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay in northern Alameda County, California, United States. It is named after the 18th-century Irish bishop and philosopher George Berkeley. It borders the cities of Oakland and E ...

, aiming to grow sustainable

cultured meat Cultured meat (also known by other names) is meat produced by culturing animal cells ''in vitro''. It is a form of cellular agriculture. Cultured meat is produced using tissue engineering techniques pioneered in regenerative medicine. Jason M ...

. The company was founded in 2015 by Uma Valeti ( CEO), Nicholas Genovese ( CSO), and Will Clem. Valeti was a cardiologist and a professor at the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public land-grant research university in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint Paul, Minnesota, United States. ...

. The company plans to produce various meat products using

biotechnology Biotechnology is the integration of natural sciences and engineering sciences in order to achieve the application of organisms, cells, parts thereof and molecular analogues for products and services. The term ''biotechnology'' was first used ...

to induce

stem cells In multicellular organisms, stem cells are undifferentiated or partially differentiated cells that can differentiate into various types of cells and proliferate indefinitely to produce more of the same stem cell. They are the earliest type of ...

to differentiate into

muscle tissue Muscle tissue (or muscular tissue) is soft tissue that makes up the different types of muscles in most animals, and give the ability of muscles to contract. Muscle tissue is formed during embryonic development, in a process known as myogenesis. ...

, and to manufacture the meat products in

bioreactors A bioreactor refers to any manufactured device or system that supports a biologically active environment. In one case, a bioreactor is a vessel in which a chemical reaction, chemical process is carried out which involves organisms or biochemistry, ...

History

In February 2016, Memphis Meats published a video of a cultured meatball and in March 2017, they published a video of cultured chicken and duck dishes. In February 2017, the company indicated its goal was to produce at 60 euros per kilogram and enter the market by 2020. In August 2017, Memphis Meats announced that it had raised a $17 million Series A funding round. The round was led by DFJ and also included investment from

Bill Gates William Henry Gates III (born October 28, 1955) is an American business magnate and philanthropist. He is a co-founder of Microsoft, along with his late childhood friend Paul Allen. During his career at Microsoft, Gates held the positions ...

, Richard Branson, Suzy and

Jack Welch John Francis Welch Jr. (November 19, 1935 – March 1, 2020) was an American business executive, chemical engineer, and writer. He was Chairman and CEO of General Electric (GE) between 1981 and 2001. When Welch retired from GE, he receive ...

, Cargill,

Kimbal Musk Kimbal Reeve Musk (born 20 September 1972) is a South African restaurateur, chef, and entrepreneur. He owns The Kitchen Restaurant Group, a collection of "community" restaurants located in Colorado, Chicago, and Indianapolis. He is the co-fo ...

, and Atomico. Initially, the production cost of the cultured beef was , and the production cost of the cultured poultry was . As of June 2017, the company had reduced the cost of production to below $2,400 per pound ($5,280/kg). The company said it anticipated cost reductions and commercial release of its products by 2021. In January 2020, Memphis Meats raised a $161 million Series B. The round was led by

Softbank Group is a Japanese multinational conglomerate holding company headquartered in Minato, Tokyo which focuses on investment management. The Group primarily invests in companies operating in technology, energy, and financial sectors. It also runs the Vi ...

, Norwest, and

Temasek Temasek (also spelt Temasik) is an early recorded name of a settlement on the site of modern Singapore. The name appears in early Malay and Javanese literature, and it is also recorded in Yuan and Ming Chinese documents as ''Danmaxi'' ( or ...

. Also joining the round are new and existing investors including Richard Branson,

, Threshold Ventures, Cargill,

Tyson Foods Tyson Foods, Inc. is an American multinational corporation, based in Springdale, Arkansas, that operates in the food industry. The company is the world's second-largest processor and marketer of chicken, beef, and pork after JBS S.A. It annually ...

, Finistere, Future Ventures,

, Fifty Years, and CPT Capital. Memphis Meats expects to use the funds to build a pilot production facility and to hit a major milestone of launching products into the market within the coming years. In May 2021, the company announced that it was changing its name to Upside Foods. In September 2021, co-founder and chief science officer Genovese, as well as process development vice president KC Carswell, left the company. On November 4, 2021, Upside Foods opened its first large-scale production plant, called the "Engineering, Production, and Innovation Center" (EPIC), in

Emeryville, California Emeryville is a city located in northwest Alameda County, California, in the United States. It lies in a corridor between the cities of Berkeley and Oakland, with a border on the shore of San Francisco Bay. The resident population was 12,905 ...

. It covers 16,154 square meters (53,000 square feet), with renewably-powered vats and tubes, in order to produce 22,680 kilograms (50,000 pounds) of cultured meat annually, to be sold commercially.

FDA approval

On November 17, 2022, the

FDA The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA or US FDA) is a federal agency of the Department of Health and Human Services. The FDA is responsible for protecting and promoting public health through the control and supervision of food ...

completed a pre-market consultation process for the company to sell its cultivated chicken to the public. This makes Upside Foods the first company to complete this pre-market consultation. The FDA made it clear in its announcement, however, that this was not considered an approval process.

References

External links

* {{Cultured meat startups Biotechnology companies of the United States Cellular agriculture Food and drink companies of the United States Food technology organizations Meat substitutes