Ever After Foods and Roslin Technologies deliver 19-fold increase in cultivated meat protein productivity

Ever After Foods and Roslin Technologies have reported a 19-fold increase in cultivated protein productivity compared with conventional stirred-tank suspension cultivation, following trials combining Roslin's porcine stem cells with Ever After Foods' Edible Packed Bed technology. The results suggest that improvements in protein production per cell, rather than cell density alone, could help address some of cultivated meat's manufacturing challenges.

• The combined platform achieved 19 times higher cultivated protein and dry biomass productivity than the stirred-tank benchmark.
• Cell densities exceeded 150 million cells/ml, with cultivated protein productivity reaching 40g/L.
• Structured tissue was produced directly on an edible plant-based scaffold accounting for less than 2% of the final product's weight.

The joint development program, announced on October 13, brings together Roslin Technologies' porcine pluripotent stem cell platform and Ever After Foods' proprietary Edible Packed Bed (EPB) production system, which enables cells to grow into structured tissue on an edible scaffold.

The companies reported volumetric productivity of 326g/L wet biomass, 57g/L dry biomass and 40g/L cultivated protein. Compared with the same cells grown in a stirred-tank suspension system, the EPB platform delivered 19 times higher dry biomass and cultivated protein productivity, alongside an 11-fold improvement in wet biomass productivity.

The results are particularly notable because the improvement cannot be explained by cell density alone.

Although the EPB system achieved five times higher cell density than the suspension benchmark, the researchers also measured a fourfold increase in protein and dry biomass produced per cell. That combination accounted for the substantial difference in overall productivity.

For cultivated meat manufacturers, the distinction is important. Cell density has long been one of the principal measures used to assess bioprocess performance, but a high concentration of cells does not necessarily translate into an equally high yield of edible material.

“The industry has become very good at growing cells, but cells are not the final product. What matters commercially is how efficiently those cells can produce edible protein and tissue,” said Eyal Rosenthal, CEO of Ever After Foods.

“What is particularly important in these results is that the improvement went well beyond simply increasing cell density. The cells produced substantially more protein and biomass on a per-cell basis. This points to a broader way of thinking about cultivated meat productivity: how much edible protein and tissue the cells ultimately produce, rather than cell count alone.”

Another aspect of the trials was the production of structured cultivated tissue directly within the bioreactor environment.

Ever After Foods uses PlantriX, its proprietary edible plant-based scaffold, as part of the EPB platform. Rather than producing cells exclusively in suspension and subsequently assembling them into a food product, the system supports tissue formation during cultivation.

According to the companies, the scaffold represented less than 2% of the final product by weight. The reported productivity figures excluded both scaffold material and residual culture media, meaning the measured biomass and protein originated entirely from the cultivated cells.

This distinction is relevant when comparing different production technologies, particularly those incorporating structural materials that can contribute to the final product's total weight.
The trials also provided an opportunity to assess the performance of Roslin Technologies' porcine pluripotent stem cells in a different manufacturing environment.

Roslin develops animal cell lines and associated cultivation technologies for cultivated meat producers, while Ever After Foods concentrates on production systems designed to integrate cell growth and tissue formation.

“Commercial cultivated meat production requires both robust cell biology and manufacturing technologies capable of translating that biology into productive tissue formation. Our collaboration results demonstrate the versatility of our porcine pluripotent stem cells across bioreactor systems and the opportunity to achieve substantial gains in productivity in EAF's tissue-production environment. The collaboration provides an encouraging example of how complementary technologies can be integrated to address key scale-up challenges,” said Ernst van Orsouw, CEO of Roslin Technologies.

The companies have not disclosed the working volume of the bioreactor used in the trials, the duration of the cultivation runs or the production costs associated with the reported yields.

Those details will be important in assessing how the productivity gains translate into commercial manufacturing economics, particularly when considering equipment utilization, media consumption and downstream processing requirements.

Nevertheless, the results provide comparative performance data using the same cell platform across two different cultivation environments, allowing the companies to identify improvements associated with the EPB system.

For Ever After Foods, the collaboration also demonstrates the ability to integrate externally developed cell lines into its manufacturing technology, rather than relying exclusively on internally developed biological systems.

The company describes its broader approach as combining cell biology, culture media, bioprocess engineering and manufacturing technologies within an integrated production platform.

Ever After Foods and Roslin Technologies are continuing development and scale-up work on the combined system, with further efforts directed toward advancing the cell and tissue-production process.
Neither company has announced a timetable for commercial deployment or disclosed the next planned production scale.

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