Imagindairy announces industrial scale production of dairy-free protein

Photo © iStockphoto.com/ ValentynVolkov

The Israel-based food tech startup creating animal-free dairy proteins, Imagindairy, has announced the acquisition and operation of industrial-scale precision fermentation production lines. These lines will focus on the production of dairy ingredients, and puts the company in a position to sell its animal-free dairy products at cost parity to traditional dairy, say Imagindairy.

“Having just entered the landscape three years ago, this achievement is a big step forward for us. We’ve overcome industry-wide hurdles that have previously been holding precision fermentation dairy back, including the production capacity bottleneck and ensuring that unit economics make sense across the supply chain,” said Eyal Afergan, PhD, Imagindairy co-founder and CEO, in a press release. “This will enable our customers to put animal-free dairy products on-shelf at cost parity to traditional dairy, without compromising on quality. It’s a substantial breakthrough and important step that will allow us to support mass-market adoption, transition to an industrial company, and speed up the development of other milk proteins.”

Imagindairy’s facility now has more than 100,000 liters of fermentation capacity, which the company plans on tripling in the next one to two years. The company has also received a “no questions” letter from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in response to a GRAS (generally recognized as safe) notice submitted by the Imagindairy. This means that the company can used it animal-free dairy proteins in food and beverage products. Prior to its GRAS notice, the company reached an independent conclusion of GRAS in August of 2023.

“We’ve always been passionate about investing in transformational technologies that support the planet and its people. Imagindairy is paving an entirely new future for the dairy industry, and these two great achievements demonstrate what that future will look like,” said Shmuel Chafets, founder and partner at Target Global, an investment firm that has backed Imagindairy since 2022.

“Imagindairy has an inherent culture of capital efficiency and achieving more with less,” added Jonathan Berger, CEO of The Kitchen FoodTech Hub. “As the earliest supporter of the company, we know it has the right technology and the right team to disrupt the dairy industry.”