The food industry continues to evolve rapidly with emerging novel technologies changing the way the world eats and produces food. Major developments include algae-based nutraceuticals, dairy alternatives, lab-grown meat, and food protection proteins. Food tech startups also address the growing awareness of the importance of food circularity and food waste. Further, autonomous food manufacturing offers more opportunities for experimentation, personalization, and productivity. Besides, startups also address the increasing demand for solutions to reduce sugar intake and verify food safety. Developments in functional ingredients, cocoa-free chocolate, and food intolerance management platforms are poised to transform the food industry in 2024 and beyond.
20 Food Tech Startups to Watch in 2024
- Prevera – Algae-based Nutraceuticals
- OFF FOODS – Alternative Protein Snacks
- Planet A Foods – Food Ingredient Modification
- Nutriient – Food Circularity
- Jellatech – Autonomous Food Manufacturing
- bio-az – Sugar Reduction
- Make it Mine – Food Safety Analysis
- Alive Energy – Kitchen Robots
- TissenBioFarm – Cultivated Meat
- Foody Bag – Food Waste Prevention
- AlgiKey – Algae-based Nutraceuticals
- Altimate Nutrition – Alternative Protein Snacks
- Food4You – Food Ingredient Modification
- Simply NoWaste – Food Circularity
- PASSTUR – Autonomous Food Manufacturing
- ZeroIN – Sugar Reduction
- Inspectra – Food Safety Analysis
- BEYOND HONEYCOMB – Kitchen Robots
- Biopols – Food Storage Technology
- Foodbud – Food Recommendation Platform
Global Startup Heat Map highlights 20 Food Tech Startups to Watch
Through the Big Data & Artificial Intelligence (AI)-powered StartUs Insights Discovery Platform, covering over 3 790 000+ startups & scaleups globally, we identified 10 330 food tech startups. The Global Startup Heat Map below highlights the 20 food tech startups you should watch in 2024 as well as the geo-distribution of all food tech startups & scaleups we analyzed for this research.
Based on the heat map, we see high startup activity in Europe and the USA, followed by India. These food tech startups work on solutions ranging from alternative proteins and food waste reduction to cocoa-free chocolate and low-fat food mixes.
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As the world’s largest resource for data on emerging companies, the SaaS platform enables you to identify relevant technologies and industry trends quickly & exhaustively. Based on the data from the platform, the Top 20 Energy Startup Hubs are in New York, London, Bangalore, Singapore, and Mumbai. The 20 hand-picked startups highlighted in this report are chosen from all over the world and develop solutions for plant-based meat, food protection proteins, food intolerance management, animal-free collagen, and much more.
Explore 20 Food Tech Startups to Watch in 2024
Prevera formulates Food Protection Proteins
Israeli startup Prevera develops food protection proteins as a natural alternative to harmful preservatives. The startup’s mixture of natural essential amino acids forms an antimicrobial protein safeguarding food from pathogens. When digested, the protein breaks back into its original amino acids, providing nutrients without affecting the microbiome.
The solution is applicable to food products, new food, and water applications. For food, it offers protection and raw ingredient disinfection. In new food, it provides final product and cell-culture process protection. For water applications, it offers point-of-use water disinfection.
OFF FOODS makes Plant-based Meat & Milk
Indonesian startup OFF FOODS provides plant-based meat and dairy alternatives. The startup’s plant-based meat product, OFF MEAT is made using texturized vegetable protein. Combined with soy protein isolate and other vegan ingredients, OFF MEAT gets a texture and chewing sensation that are almost similar to animal meat. The startup’s other product, OAT DAILY is an oat-based milk that is a sustainable alternative to animal-based milk as well as suitable for people with lactose intolerance.
Planet A Foods produces Cocoa-free Chocolate
Planet A Foods is a German startup that develops sustainable food ingredients through the precision fermentation of plants. It uses proprietary technology to ferment ingredients like oats to recreate popular food flavors without the environmental impacts of crops like cocoa.
The startup’s products are ChoViva Concentrate and ChocoVivaButter, which when combined create ChoViva, a cocoa-free chocolate. ChoViva replicates the taste and texture of cocoa-based chocolate while producing significantly lesser CO2 emissions than regular chocolate. Moreover, ChocoViva Butter can also be used on its own as a palm oil replacement.
Nutriient provides a Low-Glycemic Index (GI) Food Mixes
Nutriient is a Singaporean startup that offers low-GI and low-fat food mixes. Its Baked Confectionary Blend replaces up to 30% of sugar in bakery recipes. Whereas, its Dessert Blend and Beverage Blend replace 100% of the sugar in the original recipes.
Nutriient also formulates a Low GI Oat Cookie designed to slow down spikes in blood glucose levels and improve gut health. Despite being a healthier option, the cookie maintains the texture and sensory characteristics of traditional cookies.
Jellatech enables Animal-free Collagen
Jellatech is a USA-based startup that produces functional, animal-free collagen. The startup leverages cellular agriculture to create sustainable and high-quality collagen. This collagen finds applications in food texturizers, vaccine stabilizers, pill capsules, and beverage clarification. The production process involves collecting small samples of animal cells and culturing them in bioreactors that extract and purify the protein collagen.
After the detachment of the cells from the collagen, Jellatech filters the protein, leading to the product bioidentical to collage extracted from animals. Traditionally, sourcing native, functional collagen involves extraction of the same from live animals. Jellatech breaks this cycle by offering an alternative and more sustainable collagen production method.
bio-az offers Synbiotics Functional Ingredients
Based out of Australia, bio-az is a startup that formulates synbiotics functional ingredients. It produces synbiotic blends of prebiotics, probiotics, and postbiotics that support the microbiome, gastrointestinal health, and overall well-being.
Bio-az’s functional ingredients are designed to remain stable at ambient temperatures in high water and carbohydrate activity products and deliver synbiotic efficacy to the targeted area of the gastrointestinal tract. These ingredients can be incorporated into foods, beverages, and other consumer products.
Make it Mine simplifies Food Intolerance Management
Make it Mine is a startup from Belgium that develops an app for improving food intolerance management. The application assists users with food allergies or intolerances in modifying recipes. It detects and replaces ingredients that users wish to avoid.
Users select food components to avoid, then choose or import a recipe. The app identifies harmful ingredients and suggests alternatives. Moreover, using this input, the other recipes on the app adapt to the user’s dietary requirements. This way, Make it Mine simplifies the cooking experience for those with dietary sensitivities.
Alive Energy offers a Clean Energy Drink
Alive Energy is a startup from the USA that formulates a clean energy drink from guayusa tea leaves. The L-theanine amino acid in guayusa ensures a smoother and more even release of caffeine throughout the body. This reduces energy spikes and drops often associated with coffee or traditional energy drink consumption. L-theanine also improves stress levels and mood. Moreover, Guayusa tea is also a rich source of antioxidants and anti-inflammatory compounds that boost the immune system.
TissenBioFarm advances Cultivated Meat
South Korean startup TissenBioFarm deploys its proprietary production technique based on edible artificial organ development technologies to produce cultivated meat that resembles animal meat. This facilitates the mass production of cultivated meat with specific texture and marbling characteristics of animal meat. This way, TissenBioFarm’s cultivated meat replicates various real meat parts and is customizable to consumer preferences.
Foody Bag streamlines Food Waste Prevention
Foody Bag is an Australian startup that builds an app to combat food waste by connecting consumers with food retailers. The startup partners with bakeries, cafes, restaurants, and supermarkets to offer their unsold food at discounted prices via the app, thus reducing food waste. Customers pay through the app and pick up their items on collection days by showing the QR codes generated via the app. While retailers benefit from reduced food waste and extra sales.
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AlgiKey formulates Algae-based Nutraceuticals
Portuguese startup AlgiKey provides macro and microalgae-based nutraceutical supplements. The startup’s supplements use a range of algae extracts and whole biomass to produce its product line offering different nutritional values. Its products use spirulina, a dried blue-green seaweed that is a highly bioavailable vegetable protein.
Industrial food processors and pharmaceuticals use AlgiKey’s products to create food supplements, ingredients for formulations, and protein powder extract for smoothies. Additionally, these products provide food-safe flavor enhancement and natural water-soluble dyes.
Altimate Nutrition provides Cricket-based Protein Snacks
Singapore-based startup Altimate Nutrition develops protein bars and snacks using alternative proteins. The startup blends cricket protein flour from baked freeze-dried crickets with other edible ingredients to make its protein bars of different flavors.
It uses crickets as a nutrient-rich protein source because cricket farming requires less water, less land, and produces lower emissions. This way, Altimate Nutrition provides ethically-sourced and nutritionally dense foods that have a minimal environmental impact.
Food4You enables Food Ingredient Modification
Argentina-based startup Food4You builds a biotechnology platform to design and develop ingredients for plant-based foods. The startup uses its platform and precision fermentation technology to grow ingredients from lactic acid bacteria (LAB) on plant-based substrates.
The resulting ingredient enhances the texture, flavor, and nutrition profile of food. Moreover, the startup reduces the number of added ingredients in commercial food products. This way, Food4You provides a natural and clean-label alternative to artificial ingredients and food additives.
Simply NoWaste facilitates Food Circularity
Swedish startup Simply NoWaste advances food circularity by upcycling food waste. The startup reuses nutritional byproducts and residues of food production processes to create new edible products.
The startup produces KADO, a fruit drink made by mixing fruits and upcycled avocado seeds. Simply NoWaste reduces food waste and byproducts to provide safe nutritious drinks for human consumption.
PASSTUR facilitates Autonomous Food Manufacturing
PASSTUR is a US-based startup that accelerates autonomous food and beverage manufacturing through its production facilities. The startup’s internet of things (IoT)-based connected factory brings autonomy to food manufacturing. The startup provides end-to-end manufacturing services from formulation development to distribution for food and beverage brands.
Moreover, its digital compliance platform provides batch-level analytics and real-time inventory data to enable quality assurance (QA). Food brands use PASSTUR’s services to accelerate production processes and business operations, as well as reduce time to market.
ZeroIN enables Sugar Reduction
Canadian startup ZeroIN formulates sugar substitutes for controlling and reducing sugar constitution in processed foods. The startup’s platform enables the customization of sweet profiles of carbohydrates and sweeteners and then removes the aftertaste.
It does so by providing custom and functional sweet fibers from natural sources with similar bulking and sweetness as sugar. This enables food and beverage manufacturers to replace sugar as an ingredient in their products without compromising on taste or nutritional intake.
Inspectra advances Food Safety Analysis
German startup Inspectra utilizes AI and advanced imaging technology for real-time food safety and quality assessments. The startup’s AI-based solution analyzes the entire production line and provides real-time insights into product safety and quality.
For this, it uses contactless imaging technology, saving food manufacturers time and resources on chemical sampling. Food manufacturers also use this to accelerate quality control in their production lines and eliminate product recalls due to foodborne illnesses.
BEYOND HONEYCOMB manufactures Kitchen Robots
South Korean startup BEYOND HONEYCOMB builds kitchen robots and an automation platform for commercial kitchens. The startup’s robot uses sensors to track molecular data from a cooking dish. Based on this data, its AI algorithms continuously learn the skills to cook that dish and enable scalable robotic dish preparation.
This way, BEYOND HONEYCOMB’s robots create various dishes from a restaurant’s menu that try to replicate their original taste and quality. It also minimizes labor costs and human error in commercial kitchens.
Biopols develops Food Storage Technology
Turkish startup Biopols offers a sustainable packaging and storage solution for the meat industry. It develops Biopols Paper, a biopolymer composite-based packaging coating that releases natural antibacterial and antioxidants upon contact with food.
This reduces the bacterial accumulation on the surface of meat products and hence preserves the odor. The coating works with various packaging materials such as paper, fabrics, and bioplastics and offers greener alternatives for food packaging. Meat producers use Biopols’ solutions for shelf life extension, spoilage prevention, and reducing their carbon footprint.
Foodbud builds a Food Recommendation Platform
UK-based startup Foodbud builds a recommendation platform to offer personalized food orders to users. The startup’s platform uses machine learning algorithms to provide users with food recommendations based on their allergies, dietary preferences, and health goals.
Restaurants, ingredient manufacturers, and recipe providers use this platform to declare all the nutritional aspects of their offerings and connect with target customers. Foodbud also caters to food delivery platforms, grocery stores, and wellness platforms to stock on-demand ingredients or provide diet recommendations.
Discover All Emerging FoodTech Startups
The FoodTech startups showcased in this report are only a small sample of all startups we identified through our data-driven startup scouting approach. Download our free FoodTech Innovation Report for a broad overview of the industry or get in touch for quick & exhaustive research on the latest technologies & emerging solutions that will impact your company in 2024!
