Israeli-founded startup Believer Meats, a biotechnology firm that creates chicken, lamb and beef products made from animal cells, has been forced to shut down its operations after running out of funds.
The decision was announced by Believer Meats global HR & talent leader Anne Schubert, who wrote on LinkedIn: “After two years of building something truly bold and special, Believer Meats made the difficult decision last week to cease operations.”
“While the outcome is not what any of us hoped for, I am incredibly proud of what we accomplished together,” Schubert said.
Believer Meats, formerly known as Future Meat Technologies, which has operations in Israel and the US, did not explain or share further details about the closure, and did not respond to requests for comment when contacted by The Times of Israel.
The financial crunch comes as the cultured meat startup is being sued in the US over an alleged $34 million in unpaid bills by a construction partner of its North Carolina large-scale production facility.
In recent months, Believer Meats became the first non-American company to gain regulatory clearance from the US Food and Drug Administration to begin commercial production and sales of its cultivated chicken in the US, as well as initiate exports to international markets.
Earlier this year, the startup completed the construction of its North Carolina facility, which it hailed as the world’s only large-scale cultivated meat site, geared to produce at least 12,000 metric tons (26 million pounds) of cultivated chicken annually, without slaughtering a single animal in the process.
Believer Meats technology is based on the work of founder and chief scientist Yaakov Nahmias, a professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and was licensed through Yissum, the technology transfer company of the university.
The company grows animal cells in bioreactors, which are combined with plant-based ingredients to produce an end product that it says is indistinguishable from animal meat. The cells do not undergo genetic modifications and can multiply indefinitely. It’s free from antibiotics, artificial preservatives, and artificial colors. The process is more environmentally friendly than farming, producing 80 percent fewer greenhouse emissions and using 99% less land and 96% less freshwater than traditional meat production, according to the company.
“Believer Meats initiated as a promising and breakthrough Israeli tech startup, and for the past two years, for a good reason, they moved more of their activity to the US in attempts to accelerate their going to market and build their production line in North Carolina,” Tammy Meiron, chief technology officer of Kiryat Shmona-based food tech incubator Fresh Start, told The Times of Israel. “They are pioneers in this industry, but it also carries the inherent burden of creating an entirely new industry from the ground up, and building the production facility, when capital expenditure and operations are expensive, involving high costs.”
“They decided to shut down because timing for go to market is not good today, but it will happen, because the need is here, and we cannot ignore it once there will be more enabling technologies,” she added.
Cultured meat companies have been drawing significant investments in recent years, built around the hype and momentum that the sector is poised to thrive when they transition from the development stage to commercial production and economic viability. As the only cultivated-meat company with a mass-production plant, Believer Meats sought to prove the tech can work at scale to bring cultivated meat to consumers.
“My careful assumption is that the ongoing operational costs of running a biotech manufacturing plant, because of its substantial equipment, infrastructure and demands, may no longer align with the prioritized risk appetite of their current investors,” said Meiron.
To date, Believer Meats has raised $390 million from investors. Back in 2021, the firm secured $347 million in a Series B funding round, which was at the time hailed as the largest single investment in a cultured meat company to date.
Its investors include ADM Ventures, the investment arm of Chicago-based food multinational Archer-Daniels-Midland; US meat company Tyson Foods, the second-largest processor and marketer of meat products; S2G Ventures, a Chicago-based venture capital fund; and BitsXBites, China’s first food technology venture capital fund.
Believer Meats used the raised funds to build the large-scale production facility in North Carolina, with the promise to hit US market shelves with cultivated meat that looks, smells, tastes, cooks and sizzles just like animal meat.
“Maybe there was a gap between the promise and the actual achievements, although Believer Meats did reach milestones for going to market, but there is a realization that currently it is going to cost more than they initially planned,” said Meiron. “Funding into food tech companies has dropped 70% from the peak of 2021, and interest rates climbed, as investors became more selective, demanding reality tests after years of hyper optimism and easy money.”
