SOSV is a global, deep tech venture capital firm that operates the HAX and IndieBio startup development programs focused on human and planetary health. SOSV invests $500,000 in startups at their inception as they onboard either HAX or IndieBio for a 4-6 month period designed to accelerate the raise of their next institutional round. SOSV joins the later rounds of HAX and IndieBio graduates.  HAX, based in a 35,000 sq ft facility in Newark, NJ, is equipped with machine tools, 3D printers, chemical, electrical and mechanical engineering labs, as well as on-staff engineering and design experts. SOSV's IndieBio has locations in NYC and San Francisco, both of which offer extensive services and facilities to founders including on-site BSL-2 labs, well equipped lab benches and hoods, and advanced lab equipment, such as chromatography equipment.

SOSV

The Cleantech Open is a non-profit organization that runs an accelerator for cleantech startups. It provides infrastructure and processes to develop and motivate entrepreneurs and early-stage companies creating clean and environmentally-sustainable technologies.     The company offers support, education, resources, and mentoring services to help entrepreneurs gain access to potential customers and funding sources, high profile events, and press and publicity.

Cleantech Open

IndieBio is the world’s first accelerator devoted to startups using biology to solve the world's largest problems. IndieBio is an SOSV program. SOSV is a global venture capital firm that operates startup accelerator investment programs. At the close of 2020, SOSV had more than 1,000 portfolio companies and $855 million in assets under management.

IndieBio

Better Ventures provides funding and support to technology startups building innovative solutions to big and important problems, from work and education to health and sustainability. Given the magnitude of the these problems and the enormous market opportunities they represent, it takes the best and brightest minds armed with the best resources to address them. These are the people they seek to back – entrepreneurs committed to using the tools and methodologies of the modern technology startup to build world-changing companies that make money and do good. They're thinking big and expecting big results, and so are the entrepreneurs they back.

Better Ventures

Mayfield is a global venture capital firm with a people-first philosophy and a 50+ year track record of inception and investing, partnering with founders to build iconic enterprise, consumer, and engineering biology companies. Since its founding, the firm has invested in more than 500 companies, resulting in 119 IPOs and more than 200 acquisitions, and currently has $2.5B under management.

Mayfield Fund

Advisors.fund invests in amazing entrepreneurs that are disrupting entrenched legacy incumbents and an accepted status quo. Another way to say this--- we seek early alpha companies that end up becoming what we call exciting lightning in a bottle investments.  To date, we've invested in over 100 investments in the SaaS, enterprise software, big data/AI and health tech sectors.  We invest opportunistically, at seed or pre A stage, in world-class entrepreneurs and their management teams. We seek those that are building protectable intellectual property and who intimately know their target market and customer they want to serve.   We are super active early on with our companies and commit to rolling up our sleeves by recruiting, making incredible game-changing introductions, conducting strategy sessions, helping to close Series A rounds--whatever it takes to best ensure success.  Typically, we are the most active early investor/advisor for our companies--thus our name--Advisors.fund. Advisor first, Fund second and our entrepreneurs love it.

Advisors.fund

We believe that a radical change to our food, agriculture, and ocean sectors is necessary to meet our climate, biodiversity, water, and human health goals. We invest $100-750k in pre-seed and seed-stage companies working to transform these sectors. Our average time to reach a yes / no decision is 15 days (but check back because we update this number live). We keep our investment process targeted so you can go back to building your company.

Ponderosa Ventures

Chi Botanic

Chi Botanic creates plant stem cells that we can grow into plant products and ingredients at industrial scale. We generate plant cell cultures representing just the parts or components that we want. Plant cell cultures grow much faster than whole plants. Also, while a fraction of a normal plant makes what we want, our entire cultures can synthesize the desired product. We can grow without the limitations of climate, weather, geography, or season and without fertilizers, pesticides, herbicides with far less water, energy, or shipping requirements to provide safer, and often enhanced natural productsWe make plant stem cells that we can grow into plant products and ingredients at industrial scale. We generate plant cell cultures representing just the parts or components that we want. Plant cell cultures grow much faster than whole plants. Also, while a fraction of a normal plant makes what we want, our entire cultures can synthesize the desired product. We can grow without the limitations of climate, weather, geography, or season and without fertilizers, pesticides, herbicides with far less water, energy, or shipping requirements to provide safer, and often enhanced natural products

<div>Chi Botanic uses plant cell culture to produce plant compounds such as vanilla extract and citrus oil for food and beverage applications. The company takes the source plant and converts it into a cell culture, which is then grown via fermentation in a bioreactor, using sugar as a feedstock.</div>

Empowering sustainable food innovation through food engineering tech

Alternative Ingredients

<div>
 
 Chi Botanic uses plant cell culture to produce plant compounds such as vanilla extract and citrus oil for food and beverage applications. The company takes the source plant and converts it into a cell culture, which is then grown via fermentation in a bioreactor, using sugar as a feedstock.
 
 
 
 
 As of October 2023, the company was developing a Vanilla planifolia plant cell culture capable of producing high concentrations of vanillin and other flavor and aroma metabolites found in real vanilla. The product would initially be labeled as &quot;natural vanilla flavor&quot; due to the source plant (Vanilla planifolia) from which the culture is derived.
 
 
 
 
 As of October 2023, the company was also building a Plant Cell Foundry, claimed to be the world's first assembly line for cultivating millions of plant cells. This facility is powered by robots and is dedicated to producing customized plant cells.&nbsp;
 
 
 
 
 Key customers and partnerships
 
 
 
 
 In October 2023, Chi Botanic announced a partnership with a leading beverage company (name undisclosed) to incorporate Chi Botanic's citrus flavors into beverages by delivering the cells in an oil format.
 
 
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 
 
 In May 2023, Chi Botanic was awarded a USD 175,000 Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) Phase I grant from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) for its project to research and commercialize Vanilla 2.0, a plant-based natural vanilla flavor produced through cell culture technology.
 
 
 
</div>

<div>
 
 California Cultured is a producer of cocoa products such as cocoa powder, chocolate, cocoa butter, and flavanols using plant cell culture technology by taking biopsies from selected cacao plants. The company developed its research based on Criollo cacao varieties, fine-tuning cell lines for specific flavors. In August 2022, the company announced that it was working on the development of cell-cultured coffee.
 
 
 As of December 2022, the company was building its 12,100 sq m facility in West Sacramento and had begun building its pilot plant. As of July 2023, the company was finalizing production methods, with the aim of a commercial launch by 2025&ndash;2026, following FDA approval.
 
 
 Key customers and partnerships
 
 
 In 2022, California Cultured partnered with VTT, a Finnish national research institute, to develop cell lines for cell-cultured coffee. 
 &nbsp;In 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates">
 February 2023
 </a>
 , the company inked a 10-year commercial partnership with Japanese chocolate corporation Meiji to incorporate its cell-based cocoa into Meiji's products. This collaboration marked the first global use of cell-cultured chocolate.
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 California Cultured received undisclosed investments from investment platforms focused on clean, lab-grown food such as CULT Food Science (February 2022) and Blue Horizon (March 2022). In October 2021, the company raised USD 4 million in seed funding led by Agronomics to expand its R&amp;D activities.
 
 
 
 .
 
</div>

California Cultured

<div>
 
 Nukoko is a UK-based company that produces 100% cocoa-free chocolate peanuts made from locally sourced fava beans using a biotransformation and precision fermentation process. It also uses a microbial library of cocoa flavors to match chocolate in terms of flavor, thickness, and texture.
 
 
 
 
 As of October 2023, the company had opened a limited product launch and sold out the first batch of cocoa-free chocolate nuts, with a full launch planned for 2024. The company claims to produce 90% less carbon emission per kg than conventional chocolate.&nbsp;
 
 
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 
 
 In April 2023, Nukoko secured GBP 525,000 (~USD 637,500) in a pre-seed round from IndieBio to support product development. In September 2023, the company initiated its seed funding round.
 
 
 
</div>

Nukoko

<div>
 
 Win-Win (WNWN Food Labs prior to 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/27014">
 February 2024
 </a>
 ) is a London-based producer of cocoa-free chocolate using plant-based ingredients such as grains/cereals and legumes through a proprietary fermentation process. The company's cocoa-free chocolate can be used in candy bars, confectionery, cookies, chocolate coatings, ice cream, and beverages. It claims to use 90% less water and emit 80%&ndash;90% less greenhouse gases than regular chocolate.
 
 
 In May 2022, Win-Win was operating on a lab scale, capable of producing between 300kg and 600 kg (~661 and 1,323 lbs) of chocolate per month. In November 2022, the company began expanding its facility in Hackney Wick, increasing its production space 8x. In November 2023, the company expanded its plant-based milk chocolate to bakeries, foodservice, confectionery groups, and CPG/FMCG companies 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/24144">
 worldwide
 </a>
 .
 
 
 The company had previously introduced limited-edition cocoa-free products via D2C channels: dark chocolate thins at GBP 10 (~USD 13) per box (May 2022) and the Waim! Bar priced at GBP 8 (~USD 9) for a pack of three bars (September 2022). In March 2023, the company finalized the recipe and process for a line of milk chocolate products that are cocoa- and dairy-free and contain both oats and tiger nuts. The company also experimented with an alternative chocolate ice cream bar at the H&auml;agen-Dazs Start-Up Innovation Challenge in June 2023.
 
 
 Key customers and partnerships
 
 
 In September 2023, Win-Win partnered with the UK department store Fortnum &amp; Mason to showcase its cocoa-free chocolate and technology, including a demonstration and tasting during Fortnum's Harvest Week. In December 2022, the company partnered with Milan-based luxury gift service DLISH to include its specialty chocolate hazelnut gianduja, a northern Italian confection, in DLISH's holiday gifts. In December 2023, the company completed the 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/24805">
 CoLab Tech accelerator
 </a>
 with Mondelēz International and showcased its cocoa-free chocolate bars, truffles, and coated biscuits at Mondelēz's North American headquarters.
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 In February 2023, Win-Win raised GBP 4.5 million (~USD 5.6 million) in Series A funding to scale up manufacturing and increase headcount in anticipation of its UK retail launch.
 
 
 
</div>

Win-Win

<div>
 
 Planet A Foods is a Germany-based startup that makes cocoa-free chocolate ChoViva (formerly NoCoa/QOA) via precision fermentation of oats and sunflower seeds. It then uses proprietary micro-bacteria and flavor formation processes to create a vegan product that mimics the texture and flavor of chocolate. In addition to Germany, ChoViva focuses on Austria and Switzerland, with expansion plans to the US in 2024.
 
 
 Planet A Foods produces cocoa-free chocolates by blending cocoa-free ingredients: a cocoa powder substitute (ChoViva Concentrate) and a cocoa butter substitute (ChoViva Butter). ChoViva represents Planet Foods' debut cocoa-free chocolate product, created using Planet A Foods' cocoa concentrate alternative. The chocolate is produced in-house at Planet A&rsquo;s facility in the Czech Republic. As of October 2023, the ChoViva range included 21 products with prices ranging from EUR 0.5 to EUR 9.95 (~USD 0.53 to USD 10.48).
 
 
 Additionally, the company was in the process of developing its cocoa butter alternative through precision fermentation technology, using single-cell oils and fermentation byproducts. As of October 2023, the company was shipping this fat to early customers for R&amp;D purposes.
 
 
 The company asserts that its chocolate product could be 10x more sustainable, 20% cheaper, and emit about 92% less than conventional chocolate while also using 30% less sugar and 94% less water.
 
 
 Key customers and partnerships
 
 
 In April 2023, the company partnered with German online retailer Confiserie Seidl to launch ChoViva, its first sustainable chocolate line. The brand sees itself as a B2B player, after partnering with oat cereal maker K&ouml;lln on a new line of vegan mueslis using the company's cocoa-free chocolate in September 2023. In December 2023, ChoViva teamed up with 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/24997">
 Lindt
 </a>
 to launch a special edition chocolate bar for Veganuary, named &quot;Soft &amp; Creamy Hazelnut.
 
 
 In 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/26955">
 February 2024
 </a>
 , Planet A Foods partnered with REWE Group, Germany&rsquo;s second-largest supermarket chain, to supply ChoViva for REWE Group&rsquo;s own-label cocoa-free products.
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 In its latest funding round in 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/26176">
 February 2024
 </a>
 , the company raised USD 15.4 million in Series A funding led by World Fund, with participation from Omnes Capital, Cherry Ventures, Nucleus Capital, and others. The funds were earmarked for additional scientist hires to bolster its 50-person team in Germany to increase the production of cocoa butter and palm oil alternatives on an industrial scale.
 
 
 
</div>

Planet A Foods

<div>
 
 Atomo Coffee is a developer of beanless coffee that comes in two flavors: 1) regular beanless coffee with 100 mg of caffeine per serving made from date seeds, ramon seeds, sunflower seed extract, pea protein, millet, lemon, guava, and defatted fenugreek seeds and 2) decaffeinated (decaf) beanless coffee. The company claims to be the world's first beanless coffee maker.
 
 
 The company&rsquo;s products are available for retail purchase at 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/23234">
 Gumption Coffee
 </a>
 in New York. In addition, the company began taking pre-orders for wholesale at a price of USD 20.99 per pound (as of October 2023).
 
 
 The company also plans to open a facility in March 2024 that can annually produce four million lbs of ground coffee, made from upcycled date pits (~80 million cups).
 
 
 Atomo's brews reportedly use 94% less water and produce 93% less carbon emissions than traditional coffee.
 
 
 Key customers and partnerships
 
 
 In July 2022, the company partnered with Minor Figures, a vegan products company, to launch the 8-ounce canned Oat Milk Latte, a beanless cold brew, one of Atomo's first focus products.
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 In June 2022, the company raised USD 40 million in a Series A funding round for product development and to scale up manufacturing. In November 2023, the company secured an undisclosed multi-million dollar investment from Japanese beverage leader 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/24577">
 Suntory Holdings
 </a>
 to strengthen its international distribution.
 
 
 
</div>

Atomo Coffee

Companies providing technology related to fortification, cell culture, and fermentation and those supplying equipment including bioreactors and fermenters for the production of novel foods

Companies offering salt substitutes to reduce sodium content in foods and beverages

Companies developing natural sweeteners and solutions to reduce sugar content in foods and beverages

Companies creating natural flavor, texture, and coloring ingredients from plant-based sources like seaweed and algae

Companies producing chocolate without cocoa using ingredients like oats, seeds, and cell-cultured cocoa

Companies making coffee substitutes from ingredients like barley, date seeds, and sunflower seeds

Companies offering plant-based alternatives to honey and nut spreads, addressing dietary restrictions and allergies

Companies producing cooking oils and fats through fermentation, cell-cultured and plant-based extraction processes

Companies developing protein ingredients via cell-culture or fermentation for dietary supplements and food production, excluding plant-based or cell-cultured meat

Transforms raw materials into novel, sustainable food products with minimal environmental impact

Chi Botanic

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