MyForest Foods Bacon

© MyForest Foods

Food & Beverage

MyForest Foods Closes $15M Venture Loan for Whole Cut Mycelium Bacon

Horizon Technology Finance Corporation, a leading specialty finance company, announces it closed a $15 million venture loan to MyForest Foods Co., which produces mycelium-based bacon. Horizon states it funded $7.5 million toward the venture loan facility, with another $7.5 million contributed by advisor Horizon Technology Finance Management LLC. MyForest plans to use the loan proceeds for company growth and working capital purposes. Formerly known as Atlast, MyForest says it produces whole-cut animal-free meats from mycelium, the underground root structures of mushrooms. MyForest’s first product is MyBacon – gourmet strips created to offer the same taste, smokiness and crunch of traditional pork bacon. “Hyper-focused” on scaling Made from just six ingredients, MyBacon’s first pre-order sale sold out of its entire planned production run back in 2020. …

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Forager mushroom ecovative

©Forager

Company News

Ecovative Leading Fungi Food and Biomaterial Revolution with Mycelium Technologies 

Materials science company Ecovative has recently announced Forager – a division focused on designing, marketing, and manufacturing vegan materials for the fashion and automotive industries. With Ecovative leading the mycelium revolution in food and biomaterials, vegconomist takes a look at the growing business network of the company with Eben Bayer at the helm. Forager Mycelium pioneer Ecovative has set up Forager to advance next-generation biomaterials such as plastic-free, leather-like materials and foams, made from mycelium rather than animals or petroleum. Utilizing Ecovative’s AirMycelium technology, Forager will produce large sheets of pure mycelium material at a commercial scale for a range of fashion applications. Ecovative Co-founder and CCO Gavin McIntyre will present Forager at the Materials Innovation Initiative Conference in May, 2022. “Forager is launching at …

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MyForest Foods Name Change Bacon

©MyForest Foods

Company News

Atlast Rebrands to MyForest Foods As It Prepares to Upscale Mushroom Bacon

Alt-meat startup Atlast Food Co. announces the company is officially re-branding as MyForest Foods. The new name is meant to reflect the natural growing environment of mycelium, the root structure of mushrooms used to make alternative protein.  Founded in 2020, MyForest Foods utilizes mycelium’s dense and meaty texture to create realistic, animal-free bacon. Through proprietary AirMycelium cultivation, developed by parent company Ecovative, MyForest Foods is able to control the mycelium’s specific shape and thickness throughout the growth process, imitating the same environmental regulations found in nature. Mycelium bacon boom The company will continue to produce MyBacon, the brand’s flagship whole-cut, fungi-based bacon product, with additional product releases planned. Earlier this month, MyForest Foods announced a partnership with Canada’s Whitecrest Mushrooms Ltd. to commercialize MyBacon on …

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Atlast bacon Ecovative

Atlast bacon ©Ecovative

Company News

Atlast Food Co. Partners with Whitecrest Mushrooms for Mycelium Bacon Boom

Atlast Food’s partnership with Whitecrest Mushrooms will bring MyBacon strips to market over 2022 Atlast Food Co. – the mycelium-based alt meat specialist – has announced a new partnership with Whitecrest Mushrooms Ltd. to produce Atlast’s MyBacon strips at commercial scale. The move follows a successful trial with Ecovative’s AirMycelium technology, which allows for whole-cut alt meat mycelium products.  Atlast is an affiliate of Ecovative – a market leader in mycelium technologies headed by Eben Bayer– whose technology allows the creation of such whole-cut mycelium-based products as Atlast’s MyBacon strips. Mycelium is the vegetative root structure of mushrooms, containing complete proteins that mimic traditional meat cuts in both texture and flavor. Whitecrest is a high-tech mushroom producer based in Canada and the partnership will see …

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BaconStrips Hooray Foods

©Hooray Foods

Market & Trends

Mmm, Bacon: Plant-Based Bacon Outselling Conventional as Market Doubles

Long-held as a taste icon for many diehard animal meat-eaters, now bacon is also experiencing plant-based disruption. Sales of plant-based bacon are up 25% – double the rate for the same period for animal-based bacon – and the plant-based bacon market as a whole doubled in 2020 to $267 million, reports Bloomberg.  As multiple players are entering the space from different angles, here is the vegconomist latest from the major disruptors in alt bacon: Robert Downey Jr. backed Atlast Food Co, a spinoff from Ecovative Design, has raised $100 million to create the world’s largest mycelium farm to create its fungi-based bacon flagship product.  Prime Roots has launched what it claims to be the world’s first plant-based bacon lineup of thick-cut, butcher-style bacon in Black …

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Atlast bacon

©Atlast

Investments & Finance

Ecovative Spinoff Atlast Raises $40M From Investors Including Robert Downey Jr for Mycelium Bacon

Atlast Food Co., a spinoff from Ecovative Design headed by Eben Bayer, has secured $40 million from investors including Robert Downey Jr.’s Footprint Coalition Ventures. The fresh funds are in addition to the $60 million raised for Ecovative just this month, totalling $100 million which will be utilised to create the world’s largest mycelium farm which is set to produce 100 million pounds per year.

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