Phytolon, a developer of fermentation-based natural food colors, announced that it has secured $14.5 million in funding, led by DSM Venturing, to further progress its technology towards commercialization. Phytolon’s proprietary technology is based on licensed technology from the Weizmann Institute of Science (Israel) and addresses the need for healthy, efficient, and sustainable natural food-coloring alternatives to azo/synthetic dyes used in food and beverages.
Current natural food colors are agriculture-dependent and mostly derived from fruit and vegetables. Phytolon leverages a novel technology to produce betalain pigments by fermentation of baker’s yeast. Phytolon offers a wide range of natural colors from yellow to purple, at competitive coloring performance and cost-in-use, for multiple food categories like alternative meat, dairy, frozen products, baked goods, confectionery, and snacks.
Phytolon’s technology has already reached a semi-industrial production scale, and the company has prepared the ground for regulatory clearances in the USA and Europe.
Dr. Halim Jubran, Co-founder and CEO of Phytolon said: “The investments of DSM Venturing, Cibus Fund, and Ginkgo Bioworks open the door for broad penetration of our products in the global food industry. We are excited to have new investors who share our vision to create healthy, efficient, and sustainable food systems via biotechnology.”
Read the complete article at www.agrifoodplus.com.