Yali Bio

Founded in 2021, Yali Bio creates climate-smart ingredients from renewable feedstocks. The company focuses on designer fats for plant-based meat and dairy products. The fats are produced using synthetic biology, deep learning, and genomics tools and are claimed to be more sustainable than the oils used in plant proteins but mimic the flavor and texture of animal-based analogs. Yali Bio is developing patented technology that will allow it to create a pipeline of plant-based fats that can be adapted to a number of purposes including butter, cheese, milk and ice cream , making it one of the first to use precision fermentation to tackle plant-based fats.

In terms of carbon footprint, the company claims that its fats produce less than 0.5 kg of CO2 per serving compared to 15 kg for beef, 4 kg for pork, and 2 kg for butter. Yali Bio’s precision fermentation allows for the customization of specific attributes, such as its melting point, to meet custom requirements. In November 2023 , the company debuted a new alternative fat made through precision fermentation for plant-based dairy applications. Later, in February 2024 , the company announced the development of a yeast-derived recombinant breast milk fat, claimed to be structurally similar to human breast milk fats, for use in infant formula.

Funding and financials

In February 2022 , Yali Bio raised USD 3.9 million in seed funding led by Essential Capital to expand its R&D, operations, and product and business development capacity.