Impossible Foods closes a $75 million investment led by Temasek
Impossible Foods has closed a $75 million investment after achieving milestones in intellectual property and food safety.
Impossible Foods has closed a $75 million investment after achieving milestones in intellectual property and food safety. The lead investor in the round is Singapore-based investment company Temasek. Open Philanthropy Project, Bill Gates, Khosla Ventures, and Horizon Ventures will also contribute to the round. The company is not providing additional financial details.
Impossible Foods makes meat directly from plants—with a much smaller environmental footprint than meat from animals. The company’s flagship product, the Impossible Burger, is made through a combination of plant-based ingredients. A key ingredient is “soy leghemoglobin.” Soy leghemoglobin is a protein that carries “heme,” an iron-containing molecule that occurs naturally in every animal and plant.
Recently, the US Patent and Trademark Office issued US Patent No. 9,700,067 covering Impossible Foods’ technology to use leghemoglobin in plant-based meat. The 200-person startup has more than 100 additional patents pending.
“Our scientists spent so much time and effort studying a single molecule—heme—because heme is what makes meat taste like meat,” said Patrick O. Brown, Impossible Foods CEO and founder. “It turns out that finding a sustainable way to make massive amounts of heme from plants is a critical step in solving the world’s greatest environmental threat.”