UK cultivated pet food company Meatly, formerly known as Good Dog Food, unveils a new affordable protein-free culture medium that it claims will revolutionize the production of cultivated meat.
The high cost of the growth media used to cultivate meat is a significant obstacle to achieving price parity with traditional meat products. To address this challenge, Meatly has developed a “first-of-its-kind” culture medium priced at only £1 per liter, slashing the costs a hundredfold or more. Moreover, prices can be even lower when larger volumes are purchased.
“By setting this new benchmark, we are driving the cost of production down significantly”
The solution, described as a groundbreaking development, does not contain serum, animal-derived components, microcarriers, steroids, hormones, growth factors, and antibiotics. It is made with food-safe ingredients, an essential step in making cultivated meat a safe, affordable, and sustainable alternative to traditional meat products.
Helder Cruz, co-founder and CSO at Meatly, comments: “Our protein-free culture medium represents a critical milestone for us and the wider cultivated meat industry. By setting this new benchmark, we are driving the cost of production down significantly, which the industry has been grappling with for years.”
Cruelty-free meat at scale
The biotech explains that its cruelty-free meat from chicken egg cells grows with the protein-free culture medium in liquid suspension in bioreactors without microcarriers. “It is a huge step forward in scaling our technology and making our products available to pet owners on a commercial scale and at an affordable price,” Cruz adds.
Meatly has raised £3.6 million to produce cultivated meat products for dogs and cats, catering to a growing audience of environmentally conscious pet owners.
The company has successfully developed and manufactured the UK’s first cultivated chicken product for cats, Omni Feast, with its first commercial partner, the UK plant-based pet food company Omni. Meatly is poised to become the first company to debut a cultivated pet food product in Europe. It is pending approval from the UK’s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs for its cultivated chicken to launch Omni Feast in the UK later this year.
Reaching price parity
The company states that its recent developments prove that there is a fast and cost-effective way to scale up cultivated meat production.
Jim Mellon, founder of Agronomics and investor in Meatly, shares: “Media accounts for the majority of the costs involved in the production of cultivated meat and Meatly has single-handedly slashed those costs a hundredfold or more.
“This is a huge step forward in bringing the cost of cultivated meat to price parity with conventional meat and, ultimately, toward the mass adoption of cultivated products. The company expects to receive regulatory approval shortly, and I am excited to feed their delicious products to my dogs.”
