Climax Foods

Founded in 2020, Climax Foods develops plant-based dairy products by using its deep plant intelligence platform. This method uses ML frameworks to gather molecular-level information about animal products and combines it with a proprietary plant ingredient functionality database to select optimized plant combinations and develop products. The company claims these are indistinguishable from real dairy products. To further capitalize on this tech, the company was building its first production facility in Petaluma, California, which was slated to begin operations in early 2023.

Climax Foods’ product range includes cultured and aged blue, brie, feta, and chevre cheeses made using seeds, legumes, and plant oils. The company claims its cheeses are comparable in terms of taste, nutrition, and price to real cheese and is free from nuts, cholesterol, and GMO ingredients. In March 2023 , Climax Foods launched Climax Blue, its first product offering. The product was slated for its foodservice rollout in April 2023, with retail launch planned for later in the year. In June 2023 , Climax Foods announced it has developed a plant-based casein ingredient by leveraging AI and a proprietary formulation process. According to the company, the seed-based protein source mimics the functionality, texture, and taste of animal-based casein.

Key customers and partnerships

In July 2023 , the company partnered with Benchling, a data management platform, to leverage data science and machine learning (ML) for creating plant-based foods.

Funding and financials

In September 2020, the company raised USD 7.5 million in a seed funding round with participation from At One Ventures, Manta Ray Ventures, S2G Ventures, Valor Siren Ventures, and others. The funding raised was used to innovate and develop plant-based foods that have the potential to out-compete their animal counterparts, according to the company.