Upside Foods develops animal-free cell feed for cultivated meat

Upside Foods has developed an animal component-free (ACF) cell feed to help its cells grow into meat. 

The ACF cell feed will further Upside’s mission of developing “humane, affordable and scalable cultivated meat”.

Upside says it has successfully demonstrated this new method in a range of product formats, including cultivated chicken nuggets and hot dogs. The company aims to use its ACF cell feed across Upside’s entire product portfolio.

Upside Foods’ founder and CEO, Dr Uma Valeti, said: “Since day one, we knew that developing animal component-free cell feed would be crucial to fully realising our vision of meat that’s better for the planet and its inhabitants. Cell feed is among the biggest drivers of cost and environmental footprint for the cultivated meat industry, and optimising it is key to maximising our positive impact. Our ultimate goal is to remove animals from our meat production process entirely.”