Upcycled Flour Maker PLANETARIANS Snags $750k Seed Round from Barilla as Big Food Taps Novel Ingredients

From a plant-based diet to the paleo diet, to flexitarians who dabble between vegetarianism. Meat-eating, and ketogenic consumers who eschew carbohydrates of any kind, the never-ending barrage of new eating philosophies is sending big food companies’ heads spinning. Despite their deep pockets, internal R&D departments, and expansive retail footprints, even so, traditional food firms are having a tough time keeping up with the appetite for new products that feature different elements — or that lack traditional ones. The inability of big food firms to pivot into a new wave of products creates the perfect opportunity for innovative ingredients businesses to offer them ready-made solutions that will allow traditional CPG firms like General Mills and Nestle to reformulate existing products or to debut new lines that meet consumers’ new preferences.

An emerging class of startups is fast at work on innovative ingredients like San Mateo, CA-based PLANETARIANS, which in recent weeks closed a $750,000 seed round with Barilla Group’s BLU1877 venture arm, Techstars, SOSV, The Yield Lab, and a group of angels. The startup has created a technology that upcycles spent sunflower into a high-protein, high-fiber flour.

The resulting protein flour has three-times the protein and two-times the fiber at the same cost of wheat flour, going to the startup. The element could have principal appeal for buyers who are choosing a low-carb/high-protein diet as well as plant-based eaters looking to make sure they get enough protein. For a long-standing conventional CPG company like Barilla , the ability to swap out 30% of its existing flour for PLANETARIANS’ sunflower meal-derived flour offers the promise of an easy way to stay relevant on shoppers’ grocery lists. “If you incorporate more protein in a product, it becomes denser because of the nature of the protein.

We found a sweet spot by replacing 30% of the existing flour in a method with our flour. So, we replace part of the animal proteins with plant-based proteins like our flour, which in addition fortifies the product with fiber,” Manchuliantsau adds.

PLANETARIANS will use the financing to continue trials with diners and enlarge the range of product applications from already tested snacks including pasta, baked goods, and meat applications as well as breakfast products, dips, and purees. In 2017, PLANETARIANS completed feasibility tests at the University of Minnesota and received an equity funding from TechStars Accelerator. Last year, it released chips made from upcycled elements that posted 69% month-to-month growth on Amazon going to the firm.

Novel Ingredient Startups Are Answering Big Food’s Call A number of other startups are also upcycling waste elements. ReGrained repurposes the grain that is created every time beer is brewed and upcycles it into its SuperGrain+ flour using patent-pending technology. Renewal Mill upcycles okara, a pulp byproduct created during the manufacturing of organic soymilk production, into a versatile high-fiber flour in an effort to cut down on food waste.

Apart from upcycled elements, some businesses are also commercializing novel components, like AgFunder portfolio company Kuli Kuli , which is manufacturing and distributing moringa, a superfood that’s become the fastest growing green supplement in the category surpassing matcha. Mazza Innovation , a Canadian startup with a novel method of extracting plant-based components for the food & beverage, cosmetic. Pharmaceutical industries, was recently bought by global colors, flavors, and fragrance company Sensient Technologies. As the rapidly growing alternative protein segment expands, a number of component makers are clamoring to provide protein-focused components that still pack savor.

Ginkgo Bioworks, the unicorn startup manufacturing microbes using genetic engineering. Fermentation, in recent weeks spun off its food-related business into a new firm called Motif Ingredients that will focus on providing food businesses with components for their growing alternative protein product lines in the plant-based and meat alternative space. Apart from upcycled elements, another class of mostly biotech driven startups is working on replacements for sugar and fat that don’t compromise taste or texture.