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Cutting out the middlecow: Israeli start-up Imagindairy on why lab-made milk will prove tastier and healthier than the real thing By Oliver Morrison The trend of consumers – rightly or wrongly – seeking to cut down their dairy consumption for environmental and ethical reasons is a growing one, and food and beverage manufacturers smell an opportunity.
Recent moves such as Oatly’s plans for a $10bn IPO and Sproud’s £4.8m fund raise highlight the disruptive potential of the as yet small but fashionable alt dairy and plant milk sector.
But these products, on top of some dubious health and environmental claims, have a simple problem, says the founder and CEO of Imagindairy, Dr Eyal Afergan.
Credit: Tel Aviv University
Might a new technological development of researchers from Tel Aviv University soon revolutionize the dairy products we consume? The initiators of the development believe that in the not-too-distant future we will be able to buy dairy products in the supermarket that are identical in taste and color to the ordinary dairy products that we consume today, but with one small difference: the dairy products will be produced from yeast rather than from cow.
Behind this development is Professor Tamir Tuller from the Biomedical Engineering Department of the Iby and Aladar Fleischman Faculty of Engineering at Tel Aviv University. Together with foodtech entrepreneur Dr. Eyal Iffergan, Tuller established the startup company Imagindairy, which attempts to do the as-yet impossible: produce cow s milk from yeast.