🌱 Welcome to the Plantwise Weekly Issue #1

Tune in for the latest breakthroughs and trends in the plant-based ecosystem.

Jun 17, 2023

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We're excited to introduce our very first Plantwise Weekly, a curated digest of the week's most groundbreaking developments. This weekly edition replaces our previous monthly newsletter, offering you a more timely and detailed look into the world of plant-based innovations.

We plan to keep the newsletter free, but in return we kindly ask you to share with your friends, family, and colleagues about us 😊. This weekly newsletter will be published every Saturday morning.

📚 TL;DR: Singaporean coffee franchise, Flash Coffee, announces an exclusive partnership with oat milk producer Oatside, turning oat milk into the default in all milk-based drinks. This step makes Flash Coffee the first significant coffee chain in Singapore to discard conventional dairy at no additional cost to the customer. The change has been met with an overwhelmingly positive consumer response. It highlights that consumers are more willing than ever to embrace plant-based alternatives when they are made accessible and affordable.

🧩 Context: Flash Coffee has recently completed its Series B financing round, raising a total of US$50 million, with White Star Capital leading the round. Flash Coffee has shown impressive growth, making 23 times more revenue in 2021 than 2020 and four times more in 2022. Flash Coffee plans to use the fresh capital to achieve group-level profitability, expand across the Asia Pacific region, and double down on technology and product innovation.

➡️ You can read the full story here

📚 TL;DR: The Vegetarian Butcher has taken vegan bacon to the next level with their revolutionary NoBacon product. Developed by Unilever, this game-changing product overcomes three significant challenges often faced in the vegan food space: fat rendering, texture, and translucency.

Fat Rendering: The new version releases 20x more fat than before. This makes it crispy without needing extra oil.
Texture: The new plant-based ingredients create a tender, non-chewy result.
Translucency: The 'fat' in the bacon turns see-through, just like real bacon, when you cook it.

🧩 Context: More and more people are choosing plant-based meat alternatives because they're good for the planet - using less water and releasing less CO2. However, a lot of people don't like these alternatives because of how they taste, how much they cost, and because they're worried about their health. It's cool to see that companies like the Vegetarian Butcher are making their plant-based products taste and feel more like the real thing while trying to make them cost the same as regular meat.

➡️ You can read the full announcement from Unilever here.

🧀 Climax Foods Achieves Breakthrough with Plant-Based Casein Replacement

📚 TL;DR: In an industry-first, Climax Foods have made a plant-based replacement for casein, which is a protein found in dairy, or milk, products. This is a game-changer for scalable, sustainable, and nutritionally enhanced dairy alternatives. People could soon enjoy dairy-alternative products that have the same texture and taste as dairy products but is better for the environment and our health.

🧩 Context: Climax Foods' innovation stems from their unique 'precision formulation', an AI-driven process that fast-tracks innovation by rapidly identifying the most effective combinations of ingredients and processes. This approach not only avoids genetic modification of plants, but also sidesteps the scalability and regulatory challenges that precision fermentation methods often encounter.

➡️ You can learn more about Climax Foods and their groundbreaking plant-based casein alternative here.

🐷 Uncommon Raises $30M in Series A Funding, Focuses on Cultivated Pork

📚 TL;DR: Uncommon, a UK startup, has raised $30 million in a Series A funding round. Balderton Capital in London and Lowercarbon Capital in New York led the investment. The company is focused on developing cultured pork products such as bacon and pork belly, initially targeting high-end restaurants before moving to supermarket shelves. Uncommon is currently looking for regulatory approval in Singapore and Europe, but is very optimistic about its patented approach using RNA.

🧩 Context: Uncommon uses a molecule called RNA, specifically a type called mRNA, to make their lab-grown meat. Think of mRNA as a recipe book that cells use to make proteins, the building blocks of meat. By using this process, Uncommon can make real meat without changing the cells' DNA. This method uses fewer resources than other lab-grown meats, which could make it cheaper to make a lot of this meat compared to methods that change DNA.

➡️ Interested in learning more about Uncommon's plan for cultivated meat? Find the full story here.

📕 Refreshing the Novel Foods Regulatory Framework: Fostering UK's Food Innovation

📚 TL;DR: After reviewing the UK's Novel Foods Regulatory Framework, Deloitte thinks there's a bright future for plant-based and cell-cultivated foods. There is significant potential for regulatory reforms which could quicken market entry for climate-friendly food innovations. For businesses, clearer guidelines and more cooperative international standards could reduce risk assessment costs and encourage innovation. For us, this means we could see more new kinds of foods that are safe and good for us.

🧩 Context: Deloitte's review suggests that the Food Standards Agency (FSA) must strike a balance between food safety, consumer interests, innovation, and the food system's environmental impact. Moreover, the report emphasises that by aligning with international food safety standards, the food regulatory system could significantly lower its risk assessment costs.

➡️ You can read Deloitte’s executive summary here

🖋️ Get in touch

If there is a specific piece of news, topic, or brand that interests you, please share it with us!

Email: hello@plantwiseapp.com

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