Japan plant-based meat player raises $47m
Japanese plant-based meat company Daiz has raised JPY 7.1bn (USD47.4m) in Series C funding that features Mitsubishi UFJ Capital.
Mitsubishi UFJ Capital invested via two vehicles: its seventh flagship fund, which launched with JPY 15bn in 2019 and the third vintage from Golden Asia Fund, a cross-border joint venture with Taiwan’s Industrial Technology Investment Corporation.
Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance Capital, Cool Japan Fund, and Agribusiness Investment Development, a unit of Norinchukin Bank, also participated, as did several other banks and strategic investors. The deal is touted as the first to feature both Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade & Industry and the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry & Fisheries.
There is also a debt component provided by Japan Finance Corporation.
It brings total funding since the company’s inception in 2017 to JPY 13.1bn, including a JPY 3bn pre-Series C last year from Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance, SBI Investment, Global Brain, and Investment Lab, as well as several food companies and industrial players such as Mitsubishi Chemical Holdings. This is said to be the most raised by any Japanese food tech company.
Earlier investors also include Eneos Innovation Partners, Okasan Capital Partners, QB Capital, Shinkin Capital, and Kemuri Ventures. Kemuri invested via a dedicated Japan food tech fund. One of the fund’s LPs, diversified retail operator Marui, made a direct investment in the pre-Series C.
Daiz develops and manufactures a soy-based raw material for vegetarian meat branded as Miracle Meat. The company was set up by Tsuyoshi Ide, a serial entrepreneur best known as the founder of bio-bio-pharmaceutical consultant Transgenic and Kajitsudo, Japan’s largest organic vegetable producer.
The plan is to develop a 40,000-square-metre soy-based foodstuff factory site – which would be one of the largest of its kind in Japan – and make it operational by February 2025. This would eventually produce up to 20,000 tons of Miracle Meat per year.
Regulatory arrangements are in place to export the product, with promotion already underway to sell across Europe, North America, and Asia.
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