Cultured meat: GEA and Believer Meats cooperate for sustainable production
Innovative technologies to promote efficiency, sustainability and scalability
GEA, one of the world's largest suppliers of production equipment and systems for the food, beverage and pharmaceutical industries, and Believer Meats, a pioneer in the production of cultured meat, have entered into a strategic partnership. Together they want to develop technologies and processes to increase the profitability and sustainability of cultured meat production.
Believer Meats is currently building the largest production facility of its kind in the world in Wilson, North Carolina. It is scheduled to go into operation in 2025.
Believer Meats
The collaboration focuses on improving efficiency, performance and environmental friendliness in production. The first product to be developed is cultured chicken meat, with further variants to follow. The cooperation aims to achieve progress in areas such as bioreactor technology, perfusion systems and media rejuvenation. A key objective is to minimize the environmental impact - among other things through optimized water and energy consumption as well as circular economy concepts, such as the use of waste streams. In addition, both partners plan to reduce production costs, accelerate technology transfer and facilitate scaling to make cultured meat more affordable and widely available.
"Believer Meats is determined to tackle the biggest scaling challenges. With GEA - a global technology leader - at our side, we are reaching the next milestone: developing innovative technologies that enable cost-efficient production of cultured meat," says Gustavo Burger, CEO of Believer Meats. "This partnership increases our efficiency and sustainability - both key goals for Believer Meats. We are at the beginning of a whole new era and are very excited to be working with GEA."
"By 2050, ten billion people are expected to be living on the planet. To feed them, we need to produce more with fewer resources," explains Stefan Klebert, CEO of GEA. "Like Believer Meats, we are convinced that cell cultivation will shape the future of meat production. We look forward to supporting Believer Meats in developing and scaling their facilities in line with our corporate purpose: 'Engineering for a better world'."
GEA and Believer Meats want to advance the cultured meat industry in a sustainable way and create the conditions for industrial-scale production. To this end, they plan to establish joint ventures to leverage synergies, increase market penetration and accelerate global market growth.
Believer Meats, as one of the leading players in the industry, is driving the development of scalable cell culture technology that is characterized by safety, health and taste. The company is currently building the largest cultured meat production facility in the world, including an innovation center and tasting kitchen, in Wilson, North Carolina. With a production capacity of at least 12,000 tons of cultured chicken meat per year, the plant is scheduled to go into operation in early 2025 - without slaughtering a single animal.
GEA will develop and operate customized bioreactors for Believer Meats that enable high cell density and maximum yields. The collaboration will also focus on optimizing Believer Meats' centrifuge-based perfusion process and media rejuvenation for its proprietary cell lines. These processes increase cell performance while saving water and nutrients. This reduces production costs by eliminating growth-inhibiting cell by-products and allowing media to be reused. In addition, the two companies will work together on further process improvements, plant optimization and the scaling of innovations to advance the industrial production of cultured meat.
Note: This article has been translated using a computer system without human intervention. LUMITOS offers these automatic translations to present a wider range of current news. Since this article has been translated with automatic translation, it is possible that it contains errors in vocabulary, syntax or grammar. The original article in German can be found here.
Other news from the department business & finance
Get the food & beverage industry in your inbox
From now on, don't miss a thing: Our newsletter for the food & beverage sector brings you up to date every Tuesday and Thursday. The latest industry news, product highlights and innovations - compact and easy to understand in your inbox. Researched by us so you don't have to.
Most read news
More news from our other portals
Something is happening in the food & beverage industry ...
This is what true pioneering spirit looks like: Plenty of innovative start-ups are bringing fresh ideas, lifeblood and entrepreneurial spirit to change tomorrow's world for the better. Immerse yourself in the world of these young companies and take the opportunity to get in touch with the founders.
