IntegriCulture Raises 7 Million USD to Build a Sustainable and Universally Accessible Cellular Agriculture Infrastructure
January 20, 2022 - 4 min read
IntegriCulture Inc. (hereinafter referred to as "IntegriCulture") with
a species-agnostic, large-scale cell culture technology CulNet System™
has made one step closer to building a universally accessible cellular
agriculture platform by raising a total of 7 million USD from 12
investors in the Series A’ round. The proprietary CulNet System is
capable of inexpensively culturing animal cells of all types and species
without exogenous growth factors. This brings the total amount of funds
raised to approximately 16.4 Million USD. With the funds raised,
IntegriCulture Inc. plans to build a cellular agriculture infrastructure
platform to be used by institutions of all sizes and sectors. The
company also aims for the world’s first commercial launch of
cell-cultured foie gras in 2022.
*note: 100JPY=0.0086USD
Series A' Investor partners
Real Tech Fund
Future Food Fund No.1 Investment Limited Liability Partnership (New)
Beyond Next Ventures
Shoku-no-Mirai-Fund (kemuri ventures) (New)
Resona Capital 6 Investment Partnership (New)
Plan・Do・See Inc. (New)
Yamaguchi Capital Corporation (New)
SuMi TRUST Innovation Fund (New)*
Iyogin Capital (New)
AgFunder
VU Venture Partners
…and 1 other company
* A private fund jointly established by Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank,
Limited (President and CEO
Kazuya Oyama) and SBI Investment Co., Ltd. (President and CEO Katsuya
Kawashima).
Message from CEO Yuki Hanyu
We will continue to develop technologies to achieve our mission,
"Utilize biological resources with technology to create a healthy
social infrastructure," and finally make cultured meat a reality in
2022. I am excited to see a world where new food cultures are born.
Messages from New Partners
Kohei Matsumoto, Representative Director, Future Food
Fund Inc.
“There are many venture companies involved in the field of cultured
meat, but IntegriCulture's technology is very unique in the world…I
am convinced that the ideas, technology, energy, and passion of the
company's management team will make a significant contribution to
solving the future protein crisis brought about by global population
growth and environmental issues, and I look forward to the company's
success in this field beyond Japan…”
Hiroki Okada, Representative Partner, kemuri ventures,
Shoku-no-Mirai-Fund
"...IntegriCulture is a world leader in cultured meat research, and we
are convinced that their CulNet System will lead to a major step toward
mass production of cultured meat (reduction of production costs)..."
Hidekatsu Kikuchi, President and Representative Director, Resona
Capital
“We believe that the "CulNet System" of the cell culture platform
business is a promising technology with the potential to create new
developments in various fields. The cultured meat business is highly
competitive as a sustainable food production system, and we feel that it
is of great significance in that it can lead to solutions to social and
environmental problems from a global perspective…”
Toshiya Shimobeppu, Senior Managing Executive Officer, Sumitomo Mitsui
Trust Bank
"...IntegriCulture has an innovative idea of "recreating the human
body system" in meat culturing, and possesses technology that can
compress the cost of growth factors, which has been a problem in the
industry, and is expected to become a leading platform in the cultured
meat industry. With this investment as a starting point, we would like
to contribute to the decarbonization of the industry by supporting
IntegriCulture's business as a financial institution through business
matching with domestic and overseas customers and providing future
financing."
Ryota Yamaguchi, Manager, Yamaguchi
Capital
"...We are convinced that the CulNet System developed by
IntegriCulture is a platform technology that can break through these
barriers, and we share IntegriCulture's will to realize a sustainable
world, which led us to invest in the company…"
Mitsunori Takase, Manager, Iyogin
Capital
“The company's proprietary CulNet System is a cell culture technology
that is directly linked to solving problems such as future protein
shortages and the environmental impact of livestock farming, and I was
attracted to invest in the company because of its high technological
capabilities and coexistence-oriented management policy of providing
this technology widely as a platform…”
Michael Dean, Founding Partner, Agfunder
"The technical development Integriculture has achieved over the past
18 months has been impressive, and we truly believe that their CulNet
System will be an industry defining technology and will drive the future
of sustainable, high quality protein production."
J. Skyler Fernandes, Co-Founder & General Partner, VU Venture
Partners
“IntegriCulture's technology makes the production of cultured meat
affordable at scale, and will rapidly increase the commercialization for
the next generation of meat brands.”
Company Profile
Company name: IntegriCulture Inc.
CEO: Yuki Hanyu
Founded In: October 23, 2015
Registered Head Office: F7,4-1-3, Hongo,Bunkyo-ku,Tokyo, 113-0033,
Japan
Shinjuku Office: No.101,TWIns 3F,8-1,Kawada-cho,Shinjuku-ku,Tokyo,
162-8666, Japan
Shonan Office: BW1M-2130, 26-1, Muraoka-Higashi 2-chome. Fujisawa,
Kanagawa, 251-8555, Japan
Website: https://integriculture.com/en/
Business Domain: Research and development of animal-based cell cultured
ingredients, cosmetics and foods using the general-purpose
commercial-scale cell culture production system, CulNet System.
For media inquiries, please contact pr@integriculture.com