Israeli cultured meat company Aleph Farms has announced that it has moved into its new headquarters in Rehovot. The new 6,000 square meters facility, at an investment of NIS 40 million, increases the company's operations six-fold, and will allow Aleph Farms to launch pilot production for cultivated steaks, build an R&D center to enhance its technological capabilities, and progress towards international marketing of its cultivate steaks towards the end of 2022, subject to regulatory approval.
Aleph Farms is in the forefront of the world's cultivated meat sector, producing meat from live animal cells, without genetic engineering. Last year the company raised $105 million - one of the biggest financing rounds completed in Israel's food-tech sector.
The new facility will allow Aleph Farms to produce 10 tons of cultivated minute steak (thin beef slices) - its first product - and accelerate its efforts to gain regulatory and marketing approval. The company will optimize processes towards larger scale production facilities which are set to be built during 2022-2024.
Aleph Farms VP production and operations Eyal Rivlin said, "Aleph Farms team is passionate about changing the world around us, one bite at a time. Our new facility enables us to scale our production capabilities and launch limited quantities of our steak around the end of the year, pending regulatory approval. We’ve worked hard to get here, and it is exciting to see the infrastructure that will help bring our vision to life."
The new facility is located near the company's current office in Rehovot, Israel’s biotech hub and it will soon house more than 100 of the company's staff. In Israel alone, Aleph Farms has nearly doubled its team over the last year.
Aleph Farms said that the new facility lays the foundation for Aleph Farms to launch a new department called Aleph Frontiers, an incubator of innovation that will serve as a pipeline for new products while also validating new concepts for product development. Aleph Farms VP R&D Dr. Neta Lavon, who was recently promoted to CTO, is leading the expansion of Aleph Farms’ technological platform for different types of cell-cultured products and will also serve as the head of the Frontiers Department.
Dr. Lavon said, "We are committed to driving impact through innovation. This is why we have been hyper-focused on developing the most advanced technology in the cultivated meat industry. Expanding our R&D footprint in this new facility will help us drive exciting new advancements for the field of cultivated animal products."
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on February 17, 2022.
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