Homegrown food technology startup Hoow Foods, which recently announced a $3 million Pre-Series A round, has launched a new subsidiary. Hegg Foods will focus on developing novel sustainable food products that meet growing consumer demand for healthier plant-based alternatives.
Hegg Foods is powered by RE-GENESYS, Hoow Foods’ proprietary Food & Ingredient Artificial Intelligence (AI) platform that uses ingredient informatics to develop food products at record speed. To meet the country’s call for food resilience, the company also aims to contribute to Singapore’s “30 by 30” goal – to produce 30% of the country’s nutritional needs locally.
By tapping into the alternative protein market, Hegg Foods aims to feed the growing local and regional population in a healthy yet sustainable way and connect the two important needs of the food industry.
Hegg Foods is launching its eponymous HEGG brand, initially offering a new healthy plant-based “egg” product. The plant-based product not only reduces the carbon footprint and land use for egg production, it is also free of hazardous ingredients such as growth hormones and antibiotics. In addition, HEGG is significantly lower in fat and free of cholesterol compared to a real egg.
Dr. Sherman Ho, Chief Technology Officer of Hoow Foods, explains, “We are constantly trying to challenge our RE-GENESYS platform to develop novel products, and we have succeeded in developing HEGG in a short period of time. Leveraging RE-GENESYS along with our internal expertise has made HEGG a simple and easy-to-use product.
“At Hegg Foods, we have strong ambitions to address our country’s food security problem. Singaporeans consume more than 5 million eggs every day, while we only produce less than 20% of them locally. With our locally produced egg substitute, we hope to reduce this vulnerability and achieve greater food supply stability as part of the 30 by 30 goal.
“With our novel product, we not only want to revolutionize Western products such as scrambled eggs and omelettes, but also focus on Asian cuisines and be applicable. We spare no effort in our research and development efforts to develop versions that are widely used in all other cuisines and cooking styles. If done right, HEGG could be introduced throughout Asia. Our vision is to make this world a more health sustainable and safer place.” Highlights Mr. Ow Yau Png, CEO of Hoow Foods.
Hegg Foods also recently secured an angel investment and intends to further expand its R&D capabilities with this round. The company is currently planning its pilot-scale production and working on plans to commercialize HEGG by the first half of 2022. John Cheng, director of Innovate 360 and strategic investor in HEGG Foods, says: “We are confident in Hegg’s vision to contribute to global food security, starting with Singapore, by reducing the problems caused by farm egg supply chain disruptions. More importantly, Hegg Foods has shown strong potential for scaled commercialization and we are pleased to be working with them from the beginning.”
Mr. Ow remains optimistic about the prospects of the food tech scene in Singapore and is confident that the government will continue to support the sector by providing more resources to homegrown food tech companies. He further shares, “We welcome strategic partners in F&B and investors to join us on this exciting journey. Hegg Foods has strong aspirations to establish a manufacturing facility in Singapore within the next 2 years. Our goal is to reduce Singapore’s dependence on egg imports by 20% within the next 5 years. “
