Belgian biotech Paleo announced Monday it has secured €2 million (roughly $2.3 million) in fresh funding to navigate U.S. regulatory approval for its precision-fermented myoglobin proteins, the blood-red molecules that give plant-based meat its meaty color and taste. Beyond Impact VC led the round, returning after participating in the company's larger Series A financing in early 2023.
The capital brings Paleo's total raised to just over €18 million, according to industry publication Green Queen, and arrives at a pivotal moment. The Leuven-based startup is preparing a formal filing with the Food and Drug Administration rather than taking the self-affirmed safety route that many ingredient suppliers favor. It's a higher bar, one that signals either confidence or necessity depending on whom you ask in the alternative protein world.
CEO Hermes Sanctorum told Green Queen the money will go toward "finalising our regulatory submissions in North America and accelerating customer engagement through trials and formulation work." Notably absent from that list: research and development or manufacturing scale-up. The implication is that the science and production economics are settled. What remains is convincing regulators and food manufacturers to adopt the technology.
Paleo uses genetically engineered yeast to produce myoglobin, the iron-carrying protein that makes beef red and tuna pink, without involving animals, ensuring the final product is GMO-free. The company has developed versions tailored to beef, pork, chicken, lamb and tuna, selling the ingredient in liquid or dry powder form to plant-based meat and seafood producers. At inclusion rates around 1%, the myoglobin enables that characteristic color shift from raw red to cooked brown and adds bioavailable iron.
The company's production economics have improved dramatically, perhaps more than the founders expected. Sanctorum disclosed in a September LinkedIn post that manufacturing costs have dropped by a factor of 613 over two years, and that the technology has been demonstrated at scales "well above 10 cubic metres." Those are the kinds of numbers that get venture investors interested, though translating pilot success to commercial production remains the industry's stubborn challenge.
Regulatory strategy matters here. Sanctorum emphasized the company's decision to pursue full FDA review rather than the self-determination pathway. "From the outset, our intention has been to pursue the highest level of transparency and FDA involvement," he said. The FDA has proposed tightening rules around non-notified GRAS (Generally Recognized as Safe) claims, though that wouldn't impose premarket approval requirements. Still, a thorough FDA vetting could prove valuable for customer confidence and international expansion.
Paleo has a template to follow. Motif FoodWorks won FDA "no questions" clearance for its bovine myoglobin in late 2021 and has advanced a color additive petition, establishing precedent for heme proteins in the U.S. market. European approval through the EFSA will come later, Sanctorum noted, given the longer novel food authorization process across the Atlantic.
Beyond Impact's repeat investment suggests conviction, though the round size is modest. DSM-Firmenich Ventures and Planet A Ventures led Paleo's €12 million Series A in February 2023, joined by Gimv, SFPIM Relaunch, Beyond Impact and Siddhi Capital. The company raised a €2 million seed in late 2021.
The fresh capital follows a difficult stretch. Paleo announced workforce reductions and an operational refocus last October as alternative protein funding contracted across the sector. The company had opened a 500-square-meter R&D facility in Leuven in January 2024 with more than 20 staff; employee counts listed on LinkedIn have fluctuated, reflecting broader industry headwinds. Alternative protein investment fell sharply in recent periods, though European fermentation companies have captured an outsized share of what capital remains flowing.
Paleo did secure a €2.2 million Eurostars grant in late 2024 to develop salmon-specific myoglobin with Austria's Revo Foods for 3D-printed vegan seafood, a two-year collaboration. The company also runs an Asia-Pacific office in Singapore, launched in late 2023.
Current priorities, according to Sanctorum's LinkedIn update, are straightforward: advance regulatory submissions and deepen partnerships with commercial customers. The company declined to name those customers but said formulation trials with plant-based manufacturers are accelerating. Whether those trials convert to purchase orders depends partly on regulatory clearance, partly on price, and partly on whether consumers care enough about the bleeding burger to justify the added ingredient cost.
Competition comes from multiple angles. Impossible Foods uses soy leghemoglobin in the U.S. market, already FDA-approved and at commercial scale. Moolec Science announced earlier this year it had expressed bovine myoglobin in pea seeds through molecular farming, a different production approach that could yield different cost structures. The race, as always in biotech, is to regulatory finish lines and then to profitable unit economics.
Paleo's bet is that species-specific myoglobin, produced through precision fermentation, offers something formulators want badly enough to pay for. The 613-fold cost reduction suggests the company has solved one part of that equation. The FDA filing will reveal whether regulators agree the ingredient is safe. What remains uncertain is whether plant-based meat sales will recover enough to justify the innovation in the first place.
