The Farmless team. Image Credits:<\/strong> Farmless<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Oner talked TechCrunch through both the short-term and long-term possibilities that this funding has unlocked.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith this round, we were able to find microbes that taste and act like animal proteins, set up a lab and build a team of dedicated fermentation and food scientists,\u201d said Oner. \u201cWe\u2019re currently developing our initial product prototype, which is an amino acid-complete protein with high functionality.\u201d<\/p>\n

As well as putting in place these essential requirements for building a business, the funding should help to expand Farmless and push the limits of what can be accomplished with synthetically produced proteins.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re also pushing the boundaries of the performance of our fermentation process,\u201d said Oner. \u201cNext steps would be moving to bigger fermentation vessels, building our supply chain, getting regulatory approval for our first product and bringing it to market with the right partners.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the long-term, Farmless has enormous hopes for its protein alternative.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Farmless fermentation platform can potentially create a whole new food repertoire, producing proteins, carbohydrates, beneficial fats, vitamins, and minerals from the bottom up,\u201d said Oner. \u201cWe are building a new interface between food and electricity, which means we are domesticating microbes selected for their food properties and their ability to grow on renewable energy-based feedstocks.\u201d<\/p>\n

From Farmless\u2019s perspective, it has the potential to bring about earth-changing developments over the next 10 years.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf everything goes to plan, we\u2019ll bring food fermentation into the mainstream in the next decade,\u201d said Oner. \u201cOur ultimate goal is to free food production from animals and agricultural land, so we can return vast amounts of land to rewild our planet, draw down carbon from the atmosphere and liberate animals from the food system.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite the positivity flowing from both Farmless and its investors, there are some potential regulatory roadblocks on its journey to fermentation-produced proteins, as Oner explained.<\/p>\n

\u201cWithin the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) the novel food procedure broadly has two phases; one is the food safety part, which is great,\u201d said Oner. \u201cHowever, after receiving a favourable opinion from the EFSA, all member states get to vote, making it a highly political and unpredictable process.\u201d<\/p>\n

As a consequence of the regulatory restrictions, Farmless might face some issues in producing a protein alternative that people actually want to eat.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the moment public tastings of fermentation-based products are not allowed under any conditions in The Netherlands,\u201d said Oner, \u201cmaking it a more complicated process to get customer feedback before going through the regulatory process.\u201d<\/p>\n

There are also potential funding bottlenecks on the horizon for Farmless, and indeed any other companies that are infrastructure-reliant.<\/p>\n

\u201cTypical venture capital wants a high return on investment, which does not match with infrastructural projects,\u201d said Oner. \u201cThese bridges need to be filled with project financing, ideally with governmental support to increase the transition to a more sustainable and affordable food system just like we did for renewables and electric vehicles.\u201d<\/p>\n

However tough it might be to pursue this, and other technologies, Farmless considers it absolutely essential that humans develop a workable alternative to animal protein. And if it isn\u2019t too arable land-intensive, either, that\u2019s even better.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnimal agriculture belongs in the same category as the fossil fuel industry,\u201d said Oner. \u201cIt causes so many bad things: biodiversity loss (>90% of tropical deforestation), CO_{2<\/sub> emissions, diseases, increase in antibiotic resistance, pesticide use, freshwater depletion, soil erosion, algae blooms \u2014 the list goes on and on.\u201d<\/p>\n}

Oner and the Farmless team are delighted to have the backing of investors who share their sense of urgency and potential.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re proud to be backed by this large group of experienced climate tech investors who share our radical mission,\u201d said Oner. \u201cThey are as eager as us to find a reliable way to produce low-cost proteins at planetary scale, end factory farming and rewild our planet.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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