20 Things You Didn’t Know About Orbillion Bio
Orbillion Bio is a new startup that produces high-end cultured meats for sale in the consumer market for humans. It’s a part of the emerging market for biologically lab-cultured food products. The end goal of the process is to develop the highest quality in flavor, and tenderness. The company is a unique food processor that is making the news with its alternative meat products. To help you become more familiar with what it is and its expected impact on the American economy, here are 20 things you didn’t know about Orbillion Bio.
1. Orbillion Bio is a bio-cultivation food processor
According to The Spoon, Orbillion Bio uses a unique method for creating meat products in a lab setting. Meat tissue goes through a complex process that involves running multiple cell lines through bioreactors. The cells are screened and those that are deemed best for commercial food scale production are isolated. The best media and tissue combinations are chosen through the use of machine-learning software to develop meat analogs.
2. Orbillion Bio produces high-end meat products
The alternative meat products made by Orbillion Bio are only higher-end products. Some of the early plans for product lines include Wagyu beef, elk, and lamb. The company intends to add more craft meat products for sale in high-end butcher shops. So far, Orbillion Bio has opted not to offer chicken or pork products but plans to retain its focus on premium meats versus more affordable options.
3. The first steaks will be available in a few years
Orbillion is in the process of getting its processes in order. The Wagyu beef steaks will not be offered in a whole steak form. Instead, they will be made of a minced meat product that is formed in the shape of a steak. This is how they help to guarantee only premium tissues go into the formation of the steak for the optimal tenderness and flavor. Plans for offering the Wagyu beef product are set for marketing by the year 2023. It is still unclear which market the alternative meats will be offered through. This is slated to be Orbillion Bio’s first marketed meat product.
4. Orbillion Bio has the potential to disrupt traditional meat markets
This company has plans to follow a pricing formula that eventually brings the cost of its high-end meat products down over time. Although there will be overhead and startup expenses to recoup, the long-term goal is to continue to lower the prices of the products until they are even more affordable than traditionally processed meat products. This has the potential to disrupt conventional meat markets by providing a cheaper alternative with superior tenderness and flavor. It is believed that cellular agriculture will become a more cost-efficient method over traditional meat farming.
5. Orbillion Bio is a Y Combinator startup
The founder of Orbillion Bio was fortunate to secure investment from Y Combinator, a startup accelerator. This has given the cultured meat company an additional boost of funding. Orbillion also participated in the Big Idea Ventures NYC program and the Brinc accelerator program before joining Y Combinator. It is a part of YC’s Winter 2021 cohort.
6. Orbillion is still working on its pilot plant
With plans in place for forward movement, Orbillion Bio is still in its infancy and is working on getting its pilot plant up and running. The costs are high and will take an estimated $3.5 million. Orbillion Bio leaders believe that the pilot plant will be completed and operational near the end of 2022.
7. Orbillion Bio is a socially responsible company
According to Crunchbase, Orbillion Bio’s mission is to provide healthier meat product alternatives for consumers. The lab culturing process is considered to be cleaner as well as more ethical. It’s a new modernized method of ensuring that only the most desirable and healthy cells from meat products are included in the products. It’s doing its part to provide meat-eating consumers with meats that are made through humane, clean, and sterile processes.
8. Orbillion Bio is still in the seed stage of fundraising
Orbillion Bio is in its infancy. The business has attracted a total of 7 investors so far, but fundraising is going slow. The total amount raised over 6 rounds of pre-seed and seed funding is only $200,000. This is considerably short of its goal of $3.5 million to complete the pilot plant. Big Idea Ventures provided $200,000 in startup capital with 6 other investors eyeing the enterprise. The expectation is that more funding will be provided shortly.
9. Investors on board for Orbillion Bio
The Crunchbase report shows that there are a total of 7 investors involved with fundraising activities for Orbillion Bio. Although the only contribution shown is from Big Idea Ventures, other investors listed include Masnavi Capital, New Growth, Sutton Capital, Dart Labs I Ventures, Berkeley Sky Deck, and Brinc. It’s still early in the development stages for the new startup and it can take a while to bring all of the partners together when a company is first organizing. It appears that Orbillion Bio is moving ahead on the track to reach its construction and startup plans for the next two years.
10. Orbillion Bio is a woman-owned business
The founder of Orbillion Bio is a woman. Her name is Patricia Bubner. Bubner also serves as the chief executive officer of the operation. She is joined in leadership by an investor named Helen Liang. There are currently just two members on the executive leadership team and both are women.
11. Orbillion Bio has secured $5 million
According to Green Queen, Orbillion Bio has secured the funding that it needs to move forward with its pilot plant and other startup expenses. Y Combinator recently raised $5 million in a seed round of fundraising for the new startup.
12. Orbillion Bio is a Silicon Valley tech startup
Although technically, Orbillion Bio is a food processing company for consumers, it is also categorized as a tech startup. It’s based in Silicon Valley and falls under the biotech industry classification. The unique processes used in the development of the process are cruelty-free methods that appeal to animal rights activists and sympathizers of the initiative. The company employs experts in the field of biotech to process lab-cultured meat products. We also learned that the business plans to add sheep and American bison to their product offerings. The products will be categorized as heritage meats.
13. The latest funding round added big investors
The most recent round of seed funding brought in an influx of big-name investment companies. Among them are One Ventures, Prithi Ventures, Outset Capital, Quiet Capital, Beresford Ventures, DVC, Jonghoon Lim, Kris Corzine, Prelara, Ethan Perlstein, and Y Combinator.
14. Bubner explains what makes Orbillion Bio different
Patricia Bubner designed her company to stand out from other similar competing companies in the cultured meat market. She realizes that it’s becoming a competitive industry, although still an emerging niche market. The expert advisors have helped in the development of advanced bioprocessing that more quickly screens and isolates select cells that are of the highest quality for commercial-scale food production of high-end products. She explains that the advanced processes used by Orbillion Bio are five times faster than the methods used by competing companies. The process that allows for much faster production of the products will help Orbillion to cut costs and ramp up production much faster than other companies of this type. It will lower production costs and deliver products faster. If the demand for the products is high it will be better able to meet those demands with fewer issues of backorders and being sold out. The speed of production may be a plus in keeping their customers happy with a plenteous supply of products and less waiting time for order fulfillment.
15. The first tasting event was a success
Orbillion Bio sponsored its first public tasting event. This offered the public as well as the media a sample of what they can expect from the company once it begins mass production of its alternative cultured meat products. They called it Demo Day. Bubner was amazed by the overwhelming response as the attendees were provided samples of cultured wagyu beef, wild elk, and sheep meat. A huge wave of interest in the company followed the tasting event and it showed the immense potential of the yet untapped market for such products. The response was larger than anticipated and it generated waves of interest that validated Bubner’s notions of going into a rapid production phase when the company fires up its pilot processing plant. The outlook is sunny for the new startup, but there is still much preparatory work to be done before the first mass-produced products begin to roll off the assembly lines.
16. Orbillion Bio employs 14 workers
Orbillion Bio is still in its developmental stage as a company. Although the new plant has not even been constructed yet, there is a team of 14 people working to make the dream a reality. The 14-member team that is listed on the LinkedIn page for Orbillion Bio includes Caio Malufe in Boston, as an associate director. Patricia Bubner is the founder and CEO. The company has also hired a CTO based in New York, Sean Trigony, a vegan investor, Laura Gorges-Daley, Ph.D. as the head of cell line development, and several other highly qualified experts in the bio-processing field.
17. The expert team offers a solid foundation for success
Patricia Bubner is joined by a solid team of experts as she launches her new business venture. She has her doctoral degree and has brought a team of experts with full credentials in a range of disciplines related to her new company. The team of 14 has more than 30 years of combined experience across sustainability, business development, biopharma, food technology, biotechnology, and product development. This is a winning combination to help secure the success of the emerging business.
18. Orbillion Bio will offer unique product lines
The lab-cultured meat products that Orbillion Bio will offer will be unique in the market. They will stand out above the rest of them in quality, appearance, and flavor. This is going to be a hallmark of the company that will give them an edge over the competition. Orbillion Bio plans to focus on producing a variety of heritage meats that are not readily commercialized and cannot be accessed through other companies. They plan to help maintain biodiversity to build the best food system that works directly with farmers to create a new farm-to-table story.
19. Orbillion Bio was born out of passion
According to Food Entrepreneurs, Patricia Bubner has had a passion for science and biology since she was a teenager. Her joint passion for science and healthy food has led her down the path to investigating the development of cleaner and healthier foods using biological methods for cultivation. This is a dream that she has had for most of her life. It’s as though she is fulfilling her destiny by providing consumers with healthy alternatives for meat products.
20. There are three co-founders for Orbillion Bio
Bubner connected with two other professionals in the food and science disciplines who share her vision for the new startup. This is a joint effort of three people who all have a dream for the future and a vision that is shared. The three had worked together previously. Together, they developed a method for growing meat without the animals, which is a more humane method for supplying the world with meat products. They’re turning their expertise in developing synthetic meat with the taste and texture that rivals authentic meat products into a production system that was once considered to be futuristic into the modern system of bio-agriculture. It significantly lessens the common toxic byproducts of animal husbandry such as methane fumes and waste.