The Spoon: Cultured Decadence Raises $1.6M to Make Lobster in a Lab

Wisconsin-based cellular agriculture company Cultured Decadence announced today it has raised $1.6 million in an oversubscribed round of pre-seed funding. Investors include Bluestein Ventures, Joyance Partners, Revolution’s Rise of the Rest Seed Fund, gener8tor, GlassWall Syndicate, Bascom Ventures, and China-based Dao Foods. The company also received non-dilutive funding from the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation administered by the Center for Technology Commercialization (CTC).

Cultured Decadence will use to the new funds to create what it says will be the first cell-cultured lobster meat in North America. This financing follows work by Cultured Decadence in developing novel cell lines and reducing the cost of its cell-culture media. Cell-culture media is typically one of the key elements driving up the cost of a cultured meat product, so any company making progress on this step is good news for the whole industry.

Lobster may be the first dish Cultured Decadence is recreating in a lab, but the company said its technology can be applied across a range of seafood analogues, including carp, shrimp, and scallops. The goal is to help decrease the planet’s reliance on traditional seafood. Overfishing, ocean pollution, and human rights abuses are just a few of the issues plaguing the industry, and they were around long before “Seaspiracy” hit Netflix.

Author: Jennifer Marston

Original Article Link: https://thespoon.tech/cultured-decadence-raises-1-6m-to-make-lobster-in-a-lab/

Originally Published in: The Spoon