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Silicon Valley and the Search for Meatless Meat
Fortune ^ | December 19, 2017 | By BETH KOWITT

Posted on 12/20/2017 7:54:20 AM PST by Oldeconomybuyer

In August one of Silicon Valley’s hottest startups closed a $17 million round of funding. The Series A had attracted some of the biggest names in tech. “I got closed out because of Richard Branson and Bill Gates, with one of its then-partners calling the nascent company’s work an “enormous technological shift.”

The cutting-edge product the startup was trying to develop? Meat—the food whose more than $200 billion in U.S. sales has come to be the defining element of the Western diet. But what made this company’s work so revolutionary was not what it was trying to make so much as how it was attempting to do it. Memphis Meats, the brainchild that had the startup-investor class salivating, was aiming to remove animals from the process of meat production altogether.

It’s the type of world-saving vision that has oft captured the imagination of Silicon Valley—the kind of entrenched problem that technologists believe only technology can solve: feeding a fast-growing, protein-hungry global population in a way that doesn’t blow up the planet. Conjuring up meat without livestock—whose emissions are responsible for 14.5% of global greenhouse gases—is core to that effort. Just listen to how the progenitor of Googleyness itself describes the prospect of animal-free meat: “It has the capability to transform how we view our world,” Google cofounder Sergey Brin has said. “I like to look at technology opportunities where the technology seems like it’s on the cusp of viability, and if it succeeds there, it can be really transformative.”

Indeed, in the eyes of many Silicon Valley engineers, meatmaking is a process that’s so inefficient it’s ripe for disruption. Animals, it seems, are lousy tools for converting matter into muscle tissue. Cows require a whopping 26 pounds of feed for every one pound of edible meat produced.

(Excerpt) Read more at fortune.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Culture/Society; News/Current Events; US: California
KEYWORDS: meat
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1 posted on 12/20/2017 7:54:21 AM PST by Oldeconomybuyer
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

Can we keep the cows and get rid of the progressives?


2 posted on 12/20/2017 7:58:37 AM PST by Rurudyne (Standup Philosopher)
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To: Rurudyne

“Can we keep the cows and get rid of the progressives?”

The cows are smarter.

Elsie 2020


3 posted on 12/20/2017 8:03:10 AM PST by EQAndyBuzz (We're CNN. We're not lying, we're just incompetent!)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer
That only leads to this

4 posted on 12/20/2017 8:05:10 AM PST by Waverunner (I'd like to welcome our new overlords, say hello to my little friend)
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To: Rurudyne
Can we keep the cows

Dittos.


5 posted on 12/20/2017 8:10:27 AM PST by Jeff Chandler (Headline: Muslims Fear Backlash from Tomorrow's Terror Attack - Mark Steyn)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

Based on the success of veggie burgers and tofurkey, how could they lose?


6 posted on 12/20/2017 8:12:48 AM PST by polymuser (Its terrible to contemplate how few politicians are hanged today. - Chesterton)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

I can get about 60lb of meat from a deer that cost me about $50 a season. That is $.83/pound. It’s not beef. But mother nature took care of all the “inefficiencies” that made it food for my family.

There is a benefit if they can pull this off efficiently. Interstellar space travel? Someday?


7 posted on 12/20/2017 8:14:16 AM PST by Tenacious 1 (You couldn't pay me enough to be famous for being rich or stupid!)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

By calling it “Memphis Meats” I already know its going to be a failure.

Because they are already trying to obscure the fact its NOT meat.


8 posted on 12/20/2017 8:14:54 AM PST by PGR88
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

“...whose emissions are responsible for 14.5% of global greenhouse gases”

Yeah, right. I’m selling the Bay Bridge for anyone interested.


9 posted on 12/20/2017 8:16:08 AM PST by Huskrrrr
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

“Cows require a whopping 26 pounds of feed for every one pound of edible meat produced.”

More reason to raise hogs that convert to 4-1 or less. In fact you can raise a 220# butcher hog on 650# of feed if you slop them instead of using just dry feed.


10 posted on 12/20/2017 8:19:45 AM PST by Beagle8U (Wake up and smell the Covfef)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

I’m extremely worried this will lead to a reduction in mass animal production slaughter and real meat becoming a “luxury” product. They better not try to take away barbeque ribs and steak! Otherwise, I would be tentatively positive for “printed” cloned meat and eggs for cheap fast food, in terms of quality control and consistency.


11 posted on 12/20/2017 8:21:15 AM PST by Southern Magnolia
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

First thought that popped into my head .... soylent green. The ‘soy boys’ should be worried .... they’d be easy pickings.


12 posted on 12/20/2017 8:50:12 AM PST by Qiviut (Obama's Legacy in two words: DONALD TRUMP)
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To: Southern Magnolia

Just figure out a way to raise chickens to the size of hogs. Or cross them so the hogs lay eggs. That way you can raise your eggs and bacon at the same time.
I don’t understand why someone hasn’t done this. Beef and hogs have been bred to get bigger why not chickens?

Of course I’m not real smart.


13 posted on 12/20/2017 8:52:23 AM PST by oldasrocks (rump)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

Make the campus cafeteria at Google, FakeBook, and Apple serve this stuff.


14 posted on 12/20/2017 8:54:19 AM PST by ptsal ( Get your facts first, then you can distort them as you please. - M. Twain)
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To: Southern Magnolia

Beef already is a luxury product, IMHO.
Prices never “normalized” since 100,000’s of cattle froze to death 4 or 5 years ago.

Meh! I like chicken and pork just as well and it’s still very reasonably priced. I racked up on pork loins last week @ 99 cents per pound.

Besides, I luz my homemade veggie burgers. I eat them 2 or 3 times a week. Fido luz them too.


15 posted on 12/20/2017 8:58:14 AM PST by Original Lurker
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To: PGR88
You are one of the better posters @ FR, usually with good insight and commentary. So, I can tell from your off-hand comment that you either didn't read the entire article or don't (initially) understand the concept.

I suggest going back and giving the article a second read (or, doing additional research). While the headline may seems to be implying meat substitutes (such as soy, seaweed, etc), that's just a misdirection or misunderstanding.

The entire project is about growing cellular meat no different than what can be procured today. However, the essential difference is removing the 95% overhead factor. That is, when we consider a biological entity, such as cattle or poultry, there is a tremendous amount of 'waste' necessary to drive the engine aka body.

If we can remove all that, and just focus on muscle (meat), then animal husbandry would begin to resemble hydroponic, hot house tomatoes. Imagine identifying and isolating the core genetic compounds and merely supplying them with essential nutrients to organically "grow" meat?

That's is where tech is headed; think of the future as "meat robots".

16 posted on 12/20/2017 9:05:12 AM PST by semantic
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

Meatless Meat? Huh?


17 posted on 12/20/2017 9:15:33 AM PST by Road Warrior ‘04 (Molon Labe! (Oathkeeper))
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

Once again rich guys who think they are smarter and more moral than anyone else throw money at a stupid project


18 posted on 12/20/2017 9:34:47 AM PST by Nifster (I see puppy dogs in the clouds)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

From “Better Off Ted”:
“What does it taste like?”
“Despair?”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGlM6jGUSoA


19 posted on 12/20/2017 9:52:24 AM PST by JeffChrz (2017--the left reveal their inner asshole.)
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To: semantic

Cellular agriculture - culturing meat cells in vats, instead of in bigger, dirtier, and less efficient factory farms.

This approaches the theoretical limit of feed efficiency, by cutting out all the bones, nerves, skin and stuff, before they consume any nutrients from feed - you just feed what you are going to eat (or sell).

Faster, cheaper, better (in some ways) - and much safer. Animal slaughter, meatpacking and fisheries have the highest rate of injury to workers of all industries. Animal diseases and food-borne illness/contamination safety could also be dramatically better controlled in a closed culture tank process than in a feedlot.


20 posted on 12/20/2017 10:57:16 AM PST by BeauBo
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