Meatly Raises $14M to Build Europe’s Largest Cultivated Meat Facility

Meatly, a UK food tech startup, has secured £10M ($14.1M) in Series A funding to construct a 20,000-litre pilot plant in London, positioning it as Europe’s largest cultivated meat facility. The company, originally founded as Good Dog Food in 2021, plans to begin site fit-out immediately and launch pet food products by 2027. It previously became the first company globally to receive regulatory approval for selling cultivated meat for pets, debuting dog treats in the UK last year. The funding round includes participation from new investors like Oyster Bay Venture Capital, Clean Growth Fund, and JamJar Investments, alongside existing backers Agronomics. Total capital raised now stands at £17.4M ($23.5M). Investor Elise Schumacher of Oyster Bay Venture Capital highlighted Meatly’s progress in advancing cultivated meat as a sustainable protein source, emphasizing its potential to scale across Europe and globally. Meatly’s cultivated chicken is derived from a single sample of cells, grown in a nutrient-rich, serum-free medium now costing 22p per litre—down from hundreds of pounds for traditional options. The company claims further cost reductions to 1.5p per litre at industrial scale. Feeding trials showed dogs preferred its meat, with half continuing to lick bowls post-meal and 75% of owners reporting increased enjoyment compared to baseline diets. The startup’s first product, Chick Bites dog treats, contained only 4% cultivated chicken and sold for £3.49 per 50g pouch. Meatly’s cost-cutting innovations, including a proprietary protein-free culture medium, aim to address key barriers in the cultivated meat industry. The new facility will support commercial-scale production, building on its regulatory approval from the UK’s Animal & Plant Health Agency in 2024.