On Thursday, April 4th, I ate my very first cultivated seafood product. More significantly, I'm incredibly proud to share that it was the world's first cultivated black sea bass, made by our team at Atlantic Fish Co.
When we started our journey at IndieBio in October 2022, we committed to building scalable cultivated seafood technology. We did not want to build a "bridge to nowhere" with cells that could not grow in suspension (i.e., able to proliferate cost-effectively in a bioreactor for food production). This approach required discipline because we didn't get the quick win sugar high to showcase a product on our demo day.
Since then, I have been asked numerous times, "So what does it taste like?" and have had to judo the conversation into the amazing technical progress we've made with cell line passages, differentiation into muscle cells, fast doubling time, and, most recently, getting the cells to grow in suspension.
Although at times it was frustrating to have a food company without an edible product, we stayed true to our north star, kept working, and now can make real cultivated seafood products with a scalable cell line. I can also now tell you...it tastes like fish :). And we can't wait to share it with all of you and the rest of the world.
We have a long, hard road ahead of us, but we're committed and have a winning strategy. We're not going to quit. Bringing cultivated seafood to the world is our life's work, and we're going to finish the mission. It's closer now than it's ever been.
We're excited to invite you to our upcoming product tastings. If you're interested in experiencing the future of sustainable seafood, we'd love to have you come down (or up) to North Carolina. Please reach out to me for details.
To building a better world,
Doug