Prince Khaled joins spirited discussion addressing CellAg market size and potential
Prince Khaled bin Alwaleed, founder and CEO of KBW Ventures, joined leading venture capitalists for a spirited panel discussion at the 2020 Cultured Meat Symposium (CMS20 Online). Moderated by Nik Talreja, co-founder of 18.ventures, the panelists included Lisa Feria, CEO, Stray Dog Capital, Andrew Ive, founder, Big Idea Ventures, and Mariliis Holm, co-founder, Sustainable Food Ventures.
Kicking off with brief introductions on the various firms’ investment strategies and focal points, Talreja turned the discussion to mastering scale and the role that enabling technologies play.
The investors voiced the desire for geographical diversity in deal flow, collectively agreeing that they are interested in sourcing cultured cell investments outside of Silicon Valley. The point was made that startups in underserved markets have advantages in terms of knowing local food culture and many other on-ground respects.
Prince Khaled emphasized that cell-based meat proliferation is already figuring heavily into food security planning for future-forward countries. “Production needs to be manageable; as soon as these costs are low-enough it will be a game-changer,” he said.
“The way that animals are produced now is highly inefficient, [comparably] we can go from a cell to a full-fledged piece of meat in four to six weeks. It’s right on Memphis Meats’ website,” Prince Khaled continued.
The B2B conference, now in its third edition, runs from October 19-21 and was staged virtually for the first time under the theme of Redefining Meat, highlighting sessions on the topics of regulation, automation, scale, and more.
CMS20 Online “is focused on inspiring Silicon Valley high tech investors and entrepreneurs to get involved with cell-cultured meat and future food technologies.” The Cultured Meat Symposium annually brings together scientists, researchers, key industry experts, investors, and members of the traditional meat, poultry, and seafood industries to address latest sector trends and pressing issues.
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