Blue Horizon announces an investment in California Cultured, the cell cultivated chocolate leader. The move represents Blue Horizon’s first investment in plant cell culture, with California Cultured’s pioneering cellular agriculture tech set to revolutionize the chocolate industry.
Based in Davis, California Cultured is making waves in the industry as it develops its products which could disrupt the destructive and unethical chocolate industry, which relies on a fragile cocoa supply chain. Similar to cultivated meat, plant cell culture allows the growth of authentic cocoa cells in bioreactors without the need for genetic modification. The company is currently working on scaling its cultured chocolate production.
Blue Horizon has made previous investments in the sustainable chocolate industry in companies such as Love Raw. To date, Blue Horizon has raised funds of over $850 million and invested in over 60 companies in alt protein and food tech. Some of the firm’s recent investments include alt meat startup Planted, cultivated beef producer Mosa Meat, and microbial specialist AgBiome. California Cultured’s seed round includes other strategic investors, like Agronomics and Cult Food Science.
“Plant cell culture is another exciting technology now being applied from biopharma to food. Cellular agriculture is a big impact opportunity because with it we can also decouple some crops from most deforestation, water use, land use, soil degradation, and supply chain volatility” stated Thomas Kindler, Partner at Blue Horizon. “We expect that California Cultured will continue its leadership role in this sector because of their team of seasoned entrepreneurs and technical experts, research breakthroughs, and strategic partnerships.”