Forward Fooding

📈 74% of packaged foods contain added sugar. The average American eats nearly three times the recommended daily limit. And because sugar doesn't just add sweetness, as it does about ten other jobs in a recipe at the same time, the food industry still hasn't found a proper replacement Rare sugars and sweet proteins are the most interesting attempt yet at solving this. Here's who's building the category: 🍬 Magic Spoon: allulose-powered, zero-added-sugar cereals with 1M+ customers 🍑 Bonumose: making tagatose affordable for the first time; their lawsuit against the FDA led to a landmark April 2026 labelling win 🍄 Nagase Viita Co., Ltd. / Hayashibara: industrialized trehalose production and built the TREHA® brand now used worldwide 🧬 Oobli: sweet proteins via precision fermentation 🧬 Amai Proteins: AI-designed sweet proteins, replacing up to 70% of added sugar without changing taste 🧬 MycoTechnology, Inc.: Zukora™ commercially available in the US as of 2026; 2,000x sweeter than sugar, zero calorie impact None of them are a perfect one-to-one swap. But combined, they're starting to look like a real sweetener system, not just a workaround. Our latest FoodTech Explained unpacks the science, the companies, and why the bottleneck is no longer the molecule, but the cost, regulation, and consumer trust 👇 🔗 https://lnkd.in/dze-4Bv9 #ForwardFooding #Sugar #FoodInnovation #FoodTech #FunctionalFood #AgriFoodTech

🎉 FoodTech 500 alum Terraflos Inc. acquires fellow alum Nutri Co in an eight-figure US dollar deal, with both co-founders remaining at the helm. +NUTRI Co brings over 30 million products sold, 50+ SKUs across seven categories, and operations in Peru, Chile, and Mexico, underpinned by its proprietary "Virgilio AI" system that optimizes functional food formulation. The companies have worked together since a $2M investment by Terraflos in 2024, with the depth of that relationship cited as decisive in closing the acquisition. The deal unlocks two strategic priorities: the launch of +NUTRI Co Functional, a new product line integrating Terraflos' bioactive ingredients into mass-market formats without pills or complex supplements, and accelerated expansion into Argentina, Colombia, and Uruguay, where Terraflos already has established sales networks and production capacity. 🔗 Read the full Startups Latam article here: https://lnkd.in/d6JmtsuA #ForwardFooding #FoodTech500 #FunctionalFood #ArtificialIntelligence #FoodInnovation #SustainableFood

🥤 Regulatory milestones don’t always make headlines, but they often determine which innovations actually reach consumers. With EU Novel Food authorization for its mycelium ingredient, The Protein Brewery has crossed one of the biggest hurdles on the road to commercialization in Europe. In our conversation with CEO Thijs Bosch, we discuss what their EU approval means for the broader mycelium category and what’s next as Fermotein® enters new markets. 🔗 Read the full interview: https://lnkd.in/gDXaEsZ2 #ForwardFooding #FoodTech500 #NovelFoods #FoodRegulation #Mycelium #FutureOfFood #FoodInnovation

🍣 FoodTech 500 alum Oshi launches a billboard campaign dedicated to its plant-based seafood in New York's Times Square, centered on overfishing and marine habitat loss. The campaign marks a high-visibility brand moment for Oshi, which produces whole-cut plant-based salmon using a proprietary layering process combining legume proteins and algae extracts. The company has distribution across restaurant menus and an ongoing retail rollout, added a whitefish product line earlier this year, and reported year-over-year revenue growth alongside a community funding round. Oshi's Times Square placement signals continued commercial ambition in a category that has consistently trailed meat alternatives in both investment and consumer adoption, framing ocean conservation as the broader movement behind its product mission. 🔗 Read the full vegconomist article here: https://lnkd.in/gtgtSHAR #ForwardFooding #FoodTech500 #AlternativeProtein #PlantBased #Seafood #FoodInnovation

🌱 FoodTech 500 alum IUNU receives a minority investment from Enza Zaden, deepening an existing collaboration centered on combining plant genetics with AI-driven crop imaging. At the core of the partnership is IUNU's LUNA Imaging System, deployed at Enza Zaden's Innovation Center in the Netherlands, where it captures high-frequency data from thousands of plants per greenhouse. The system creates a feedback loop between AI phenotyping and genetics research, helping accelerate the development and commercial rollout of new vegetable varieties by providing objective, data-backed insight into how crops perform in real growing conditions. For growers, the collaboration aims to reduce the uncertainty that often exists between a variety's genetic promise and its actual commercial performance. By tracking crop development at scale across large plant populations, IUNU and Enza Zaden intend to shorten time-to-market for new varieties with greater confidence in field outcomes. 🔗 Read the full iGrow News article: https://lnkd.in/dtRqswwb #ForwardFooding #FoodTech500 #AgTech #ArtificialIntelligence #PrecisionAgriculture #FoodInnovation #SmartFarming

🍫 "Good for you" and "tastes good" have been fighting each other for decades. Just look at every protein bar that nails the macros and misses the flavor. For more than a decade, MycoTechnology, Inc. has been building a fungal fermentation platform that creates ingredients designed to change flavor for good. Between ClearIQ™ Natural Flavor and its newest innovation, Zukora™ Honey Truffle Sweet Protein, the company is working to close the gap between better-for-you and better-tasting. We talked to CEO Jordi Ferre about why that trade-off exists in the first place, and how the MycoTechnology team is trying to make it obsolete. Full interview: https://lnkd.in/gEVEQ_Eg #ForwardFooding #FoodTech500 #CleanLabel #SugarReduction #Fermentation #FutureOfFood

🇩🇪 FoodTech 500 alum MicroHarvest is building Europe's first industrial-scale microbial protein facility at the Leuna Chemical Park in Germany, targeting 15,000 metric tonnes of protein annually. The facility will use biomass fermentation to convert regional agricultural byproducts, including molasses from nearby sugar production, into a protein powder with over 60% crude protein content, amino acids, vitamins, and minerals. The process takes just 24 hours from raw material input to finished powder, requires no genetic engineering, and operates year-round independent of weather. MicroHarvest will initially target the animal feed sector before expanding into human food ingredients pending European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) Novel Food approval. The Leuna facility builds on proof-of-concept from the company's 2023 Lisbon pilot plant and is expected to create approximately 25 new jobs on-site. 🔗 Read the full bionity.com article: https://lnkd.in/dBAC24qq #ForwardFooding #FoodTech500 #AlternativeProtein #Fermentation #FoodInnovation

💰🪲 FoodTech 500 alum BugBiome secures a £500,000 Innovate UK grant to develop a biological insecticide targeting cabbage stem flea beetles in oilseed rape. The 24-month collaborative project involves the John Innes Centre, Harper Adams University, and APPLIED INSECT SCIENCE, bringing together leading beetle pest experts to advance both the science and behavioural characterisation of the new bioinsecticide. The project marks BugBiome's expansion beyond sucking pests into coleopteran (beetle) pests, broadening its biological crop protection platform beyond its existing aphicide product. BugBiome aims to commercialize the beetle insecticide following project completion, offering farmers a biological alternative as regulatory restrictions continue to reduce the availability of chemical options. 🔗 Read the full Eastern Daily Press article here: https://lnkd.in/eXv7jZST #ForwardFooding #FoodTech500 #AgTech #SustainableFarming #CropProtection #FoodInnovation

🌱 The most abundant protein on Earth is found in every green plant. And until very recently, it was completely unavailable to eat. That's Rubisco. And it's having its moment. Plantible Foods, Leaft Foods, FUDI Protein, Kyomei, and Day 8 are leading a new category of leaf-derived protein that's nutritionally comparable to whey and egg, at exactly the moment when these two are under the most supply pressure they've seen in years. They're joined by a fast-growing ecosystem: Rubisco Foods, Sustainable Planet, GreenOnyx, microTERRA, DryGro, -ful (Ful Foods), Rinus & Hans, and Fyto, Inc. Edition 01 of the Forward Fooding Novel Ingredients Series goes deep on the science, the startups, and why the timing is now 🔗 https://lnkd.in/g65KwTbn #ForwardFooding #FoodTech500 #AgriFoodTech #FoodInnovation #FutureFood #NovelIngredients #AlternativeProtein

🤠🧀 FoodTech 500 alum Those Vegan Cowboys launches Margaret's Finest, a collaborative protein discovery program for precision-fermented animal-free casein proteins. The program aims to find out which proteins offer the most commercial value across applications like cheese, dairy alternatives, sports nutrition, infant formula, and chocolate. Those Vegan Cowboys is inviting partners with application expertise to co-design research, form consortia, and jointly identify where different caseins can deliver the greatest functional or nutritional advantage. 🔗 Read the full Green Queen Media article here: https://lnkd.in/gG7SyrD8 #ForwardFooding #FoodTech500 #AlternativeProtein #PrecisionFermentation #FoodInnovation