Prince Khaled’s KBW Ventures invests in US-based foodtech startup

KBW Ventures, founded by Prince Khaled bin Alwaleed, has invested in Black Sheep Foods, a San Francisco-based foodtech startup.

The company has raised $12.3m in Series A funding led by plant-based venture veterans Unovis, with participation from Bessemer Ventures Partners, AgFunder, and KBW Ventures.

San Francisco based foodtech startup @blacksheepeat has raised $12.3MM in Series A funding led by plant-based venture veterans Unovis, alongside @BessemerVP, @AgFunder, and KBW Ventures. #venturecapitalhttps://t.co/F1ee06iWAf

— KBW Ventures (@KBW_Ventures) December 9, 2022

The funding will help to scale up production for the company’s debut lamb made from plants for national distribution.

“Our minds associate meat with a shape, a texture, and a flavor,” said Sunny Kumar, CEO and co-founder of Black Sheep Foods.

“While texture has been the focus of meat innovation, flavour is a white space. We’re in the business of giving consumers access to the most delicious meat variety, using plants instead of animals.”

The latest raise has scaled the company’s total investment to $18.05m since its inception in 2019.

“Black Sheep Foods’ lamb is shockingly good. With taste being a vital aspect of customer adoption, Black Sheep Foods will easily dominate amongst plant-based meats,” added Prince Khaled.

“Additionally, game meats are still a wide open playing field. There’s a whole range of taste profiles that Black Sheep will be able to explore, especially with the company’s technology, allowing for an amplified flavor, excellent texture, and a strong nutritional profile.”

The company’s patent pending flavor technology allows them to isolate the flavour molecules that give any animal meat its distinctive flavour, identify the same molecules in plants, and reconstruct the depth of meat flavour using only plants, a statement said.

Earlier this year, KBW Ventures also invested in Oakland-based Eclipse Foods, a sustainable, plant-based dairy producer.

Read: Prince Khaled’s KBW Ventures invests in US-based Eclipse Foods

Prince Khaled, who is also the CEO of KBW Ventures, was named to the advisory board of the $15m ‘Xprize Feed the Next Billion’ a worldwide competition to find alternatives to meat-based diets, last year.

Read: Prince Khaled named in advisory board of $15m global food tech challenge