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Diving overview:
- Better Meat received a patent on Tuesday for a process to produce mycoprotein. Fermenting fungus called Neurospora crassa.. According to CEO Paul Shapiro, this will help the company produce products at lower costs.
- Shapiro said distribution stability gives Better Meat a market advantage over its competitors. patent The scope of protection is expanded to cover the company’s method of drying mycelium into powder for further application. Most other mycelium manufacturers have frozen or refrigerated products, which can affect quality and create undesirable textures, Shapiro said.
- “Essentially, this means we can now place the product anywhere very inexpensively,” Shapiro told Food Dive. “Any company will be able to store our products at room temperature without incurring expensive initial storage costs.”
Dive Insights:
The key difference in the new patent compared to other patents Better Meat has received is that this patent covers the company’s shelf-stable mycelium. This gives the company an immediate advantage over its competitors.
“If you think about products like textured plant proteins, these products are generally stable during shelf life, but they need to be hydrated for 15 to 30 minutes before they can be utilized,” Shapiro said. “In our case, you can use the product just one second after moisturizing.”
This allows Rhiza mycoprotein to maintain its meat-like texture even after drying and milling, he said.
mycoprotein It is growing in popularity in the alternative protein space. they expected to grow It is recording an average annual growth rate of 6.9%. According to Precedence Research, 2033. The growing popularity of sustainable protein sources has increased the demand for these products.
Shapiro said he believes Better Meat’s proposal. It is the only commercial shelf-stable mycoprotein product available to consumers. “Small, pre-profitable startups may try this, but no one in the market is offering a stable, granular commercial product of its own,” he said.
The company has other patent applications pending involving new species of mycoprotein that it hopes to grow for new products.
“Just as animal proteins differ greatly, from beef to chicken to pork, fungal proteins also vary greatly. There are thousands of species of fungi that can be utilized to achieve a variety of goals. Dairy products, eggs, and even wheat alternatives are all options,” Shapiro said..
