When your dinner is printed with Eshchar Ben-Shitrit of Redefine Meat

Hello and welcome to How I Built This Lab. I'm Guy Raz. So it's not a coincidence that The more we're learning about meat production and its impact on the planet, the more meat alternatives we're seeing on the market. And we've talked to founders in this space before, like Pat Brown of Impossible Foods, or Ethan Brown, no relation of Beyond Meat. And if you haven't heard those episodes, you should definitely go back and check those out. Just search for Ethan Brown how I built this, Pat Brown how I built this, and you'll find them. My guest today is also working in the alternative meat space. His name is Eshhar Ben Shit, and he launched his company Redefine Meat.

Back in two thousand eighteen, outside of Tel Aviv in Israel. And unlike other companies, Redefined Meat is using 3D printing technology to create plant-based beef. Pork and lamb, products that really look and taste just like their animal-based counterparts. In fact, I've tried a redefined meat steak. And I was blown away. Eshhar grew up in Israel on a kibbutz, surrounded by family and nature.

His father worked with turkeys and his mom took care of dairy animals. And when Eshhar left the kiboots as a teenager, He eventually got a law degree and then an MBA and went to work at Hewlett Packard. in Israel, where he first started to learn all about printing. And while he was always ambitious, he never thought of himself as an entrepreneur or a risk taker. His plan was to work in a steady corporate job advancing gradually and slowly.

One of my closest mentors, he told me once that I should become a CEO one day. And in order to become a CO, you need to be first a product manager because then you're a CO of a product. So I went to H P to become a product manager of a product. And what was the product you were you were looking after? I was in charge of basically helping

Packaging companies. Yeah, print packages that are made uh very fast and can be personalized. So they c can write your name on the chocolate package. Which is a very, very difficult technology. Very exciting business.

That nobody knows exists because nobody understands all of these big industries that are behind the scene of all of our consumption. So all right, so you were there for uh I think about five years or four four or five years um at at HP and Um and while you were there you met a guy named Adam Lahav, from what I read, who um would eventually become a co founder. And he was also working in printing?

So he was a product manager and he did the same revolution in the field of flexible packaging. So your Cheetos, your Doritos, everything that comes in a bag. Pouches? Eh, he developed and launched and sold the first digital production Printing press for Pouches and flexible packaging.

In parallel. So we we had the parallel path. Got it. While while the two of you were there, did did did you ever talk No, w we actually talked about how we're not the type of people that are going to start our own business and that we we are corporate, we are really good in corporate.

And that one day we will both be CEOs or senior managers in big companies. That was your goal. It was our belief, our belief that we're limited. That we we don't have this ability to take risk. We also become fathers at the same time. Yeah, but we were also very frustrated because we were thirty at that time and I told Adam once, we have forty more years to work. What are we going to do in these forty years? So you guys are

Thirty. Still very young, but you're feeling like you're old. But your goal, your ambition 'Cause you were not a risk taker. Right,'cause a lot of people think that entrepreneurs are risk takers and they jump out of airplanes without parachutes and I and and it's not actually true. Um

But you really Don't define yourself as a risk taker and your path your your path was like, I'm just gonna keep doing this. And maybe I'll become a senior official senior leader at H P or maybe I'll become a senior leader at another company. Yeah, and also um

Why would I take a risk when the career path is so amazing and so successful? uh and it's actually quite interesting what I'm doing. I met great people all over the world. I went to conferences. I I could live the life that I thought were right for me, which was so different than my life of my parents that basically do what they want to do and not what anybody or the corporate world defines for them to do. It's interesting because a lot of the f the entrepreneurs and founders we have on the show worked in corporate environments and found that they could not work in those environments because they couldn't deal with the meetings and the rigidity and the rules and the bureaucracy. But it sounds like you actually We're comfortable in that world. Like you could navigate that.

Yeah, and and I think it's very easy because it provides you with a lot of comfort and a lot of security. And also you you tell yourself the story of why this is right for me. What is the reason that I'm very good at that, and not where your creativity or your dream can can come into reality. Yeah, because that's not an option. You need to say my passion is really growing the amazing field of making printers more profitable. So you need to believe in that. Until you find what is really right for you. Until you find this this individual

calling or purpose. that you say then it's not a risk. Then if if I don't pursue this path um I'm risking something big. But I was the guy actually that killed for a lot of people The startup dream because I was very good in explaining why every startup will fail. Oh, so when people come to you and they'd say, Uh Eshgar, I have this great idea, I want to talk to you, it'd say, Well

It's it's not gonna work. You were the guy that was saying that to people? Yeah. I was very good at that because also it's it's very easy. Yeah. Yeah.

All right, so you were at HP for a few years and then and I guess you went to to another company called HighCon, which was a startup that uh at that time was using 3D printing technologies to I guess to create like foldable boxes. And presumably that move was to become I don't know, maybe eventually become the CEO of that company? Uh yes, but it's also more fundamental when my my son was born. Immediately I started thinking differently in what I'm doing.

And I said, let's go to something smaller, let's go to something that is different and and not really be stuck in the corporate ladder, but I went to something that was already I went s straight into it being a VP marketing of a startup that I thought is going to grow dramatically. uh really, really amazing people with a big dream and and the culture of uh one hundred people. It wasn't a tiny startup. But this culture of of we're doing something that will change the world. Yeah. All right, so you were there for about two years and obviously learning a lot about three D printing.

Um So So tell me I mean th you're a guy who's not a risk taker. You're a corporate guy, you are gonna become a CEO. But

You decided to take a big risk and start your own company. Tell me the genesis of this idea of thinking like Maybe I should start my own thing. How did that even begin? So it's an intersection of two elements in my life. Uh actually d the the real decision to take the leap into the deep water was when when my second son was born. Uh when my second son was born, I just quit my job without a plan. There wasn't a plan. It wasn't that I knew we were going to start redefined meat.

That w is one element. The other element is that I stopped eating meat. So I was a big meat consumer. Really, y you would ask me ten years ago what is my hobby, I will tell you meat is my hobby. Wow. Um because I I I love cooking and I spent a lot of time we we used to have a family restaurant and I used to spend a lot of time in the kitchen cooking and I became fascinated about finding the best meat and getting connections to the best butchers and getting notified when they slaughter three week Year old lamb. Uh and when my son was born I stopped eating meat. I started feeling bad. Why? For tell me why you stopped eating meat.

So there's a lot of reasons why people stop eating meat. For me it was the fact that you're eating somebody's elf skid. I I looked at my son, I have now three boys, and I said I don't want to be eating somebody's else child. Wow. The other element, I took my son to the dairy farm. I still l like to take my kids to the dairy farm. And when I was a kid, the dairy farm was romantic. It's the place where milk come from and you have these amazing creatures. Now it's really sad because you see the separation of calves from the mother cow.

And and you see the pain and you see the suffering and you see the agony. And doing it with your kids and explaining so why are the kids there and the mother there and what is happening to the kids and what will happen to the mothers later on. It's really sad. And my my brain made this connection between what I'm eating And the living creature that I know more than the average person. So let's just step back for a moment and and talk about Yeah.

p part of the I think part of the big picture around Around meat in general, meat consumption. And I and I'll say I say this as a meat eater. I ate meat this weekend and I I you know, I do eat it, but um I was reading about, you know, sort of the the the carbon footprint of of beef in in particular. And it's just it just kind of outweighs every other

You know, animals like for every kilogram of beef. A hundred kilograms of carbon emissions are produced. And uh you know, for poultry it's about ten kilograms. So just o you know, completely o overshadows all other kinds of meat production. So beef is really So part of this idea I guess not just for you but with other

Plant meat companies. is to solve this problem to enable people to eat meat Without actually doing the damage that meat production does. One hundred percent. And and the challenge is that that everybody is aware of the fact that beef consumption doesn't make any sense.

Yeah, most of the food around the world goes to cows and not to human beings. The water The a cows basically are one billion Population of one billion. that eats more food and wo and consumes more water than all of the human population. And we continue to raise

These animals? because they make a really tasty food product. Not for nutrition. You you can have nutrition by eating lentils or chicken, which is more effective. Uh you can eat pork which is is not good for the environment. But we just enjoy so much eating beef. Because it's so complicated, because it's so rich, it's so special, and almost every um culture around the world elevates beef more than any other food product. And it's an expensive food product and we buy more and more of that and the prices are increasing.

a and the the environment is paying a higher burden. Yeah. So it w it was that was it. It was simple as that. And and I guess you're thinking about Could there be something in plant based meats?

That I could do. When when I quit my job uh from High Con with a two Two boys. I I had many options. The the most immediate options was to find a new job. But but the there was this notion of maybe there is a revolution in plant based meat. And maybe this is my purpose. My purpose is to take part in this revolution.

We're gonna take a quick break, but when we come back more from Eshkar about his leap into the plant-based meat revolution, stay with us, I'm Guy Raz, and you're listening to how I built this lab. When I was a kid, I used to love building with Legos and Lincoln locks. I would spend hours working on these elaborate creations, these villages and towns. And looking back, I realized how that kind of play really helped me build confidence and Develop a sense of wonder and creativity and curiosity. So fast forward to today, and my kids for years have really enjoyed the incredible selection of projects. From KiwiCo, everything from solar-powered vehicles to robots, it's absolutely amazing the options that they have. KiwiCo projects are designed by a team of educators, makers, engineers, and rocket scientists who brainstorm hundreds of ideas to create the most exciting, age appropriate, and educational projects. And best of all,

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Building your company becomes an art form. Join over 100,000 companies banking with Mercury at Mercury.com. Mercury is a financial technology company, not a bank. Banking services provided by Choice Financial Group and Evolve Bank and Trust. Members FDIC. One more thing before we get back to the show, please make sure to click the follow button on your podcast app so you never miss a new episode of the show. It's usually just at the top of the app, and it's totally free. Welcome back to how I built this lab. I'm Guy Raz. My guest today is Eshar Ben Sheetrit, who back in 2018 quit his job without a plan

to join in on the growing momentum around plant-based meat alternatives. So I I actually emailed both Impossible and Beyond and told them you should start working on three D printed meat and I want to be the guy to do it and they didn't answer. But but it was more on how do I get into this industry. So what is my reason to contribute something to this industry that I want to be a part of? And and it was a nice story. I know printing, I know three D printing. Maybe there is a story we can tell of how three D printing can help and then I'm the expert. And who else in the world? Yeah. uh is a three D printing expert that has a passion for meat reduction or avoidance of meat

that is willing to devote ten years of his life for that and and it's probably me. Mm. All right, so you I guess you reach out to a few companies, right, to propose this idea around three D printing. Uh meet and you don't hear back. Uh but this I g I mean this opportunity seems

Big, too big to ignore. So so tell me more about your thinking during that time. At that point of time, nobody was talking about stakes, it was considered science fiction moonshot. How can we make a steak out of plants? A burger makes sense? Sausage chicken nugget. Well the steak is the most complicated food product that we eat.

And there is no food technology that exists that can reach to this level of complexity and three D printing has a lot of disadvantages, a lot, a lot, a lot. But complexity is the number one benefit. There's no added cost for complexity.

So Essentially I mean is I mean for everyone's who's tried impossible meat or beyond meat It's it's not easy, but it's relatively easy to replicate ground meat. You can you know, it's been done for a while, um but making a steak actually trying to replicate a stake with the you know, all of the the the different m intramuscular

layers it's very hard to do. You're thinking well maybe given your background in three D printing, maybe there's a way to actually Three D print. A stake.

that actually replicates a stake. To actually use plant based materials to do this. But you your experience in three D printing was with hard materials, right? I mean Three D printing with Food materials are totally different.

different beast, I imagine. It's totally different business and also I didn't have experience as a technologist. I had experience in conferences, making presentation. Right. And the first few months uh playing in my kitchen, actually squeezing different protein stuff out of syringes to to emulate three D printing. And I even bought a three D printer for for quite a lot of money out of my pocket that I didn't know how to operate for six months.

Uh was a very, very Immature. way of starting a business. But it was also fun and also was very honest because I thought that by this creation in the garage I will come up with a revolution that will change the world. But but it's naive beginning led to something serious.

That we we didn't plan necessarily. So this is two thousand eighteen and you are like literally with syringes injecting just lines of what, like Uh I don't know. different fats and like, you know, m b basically most most um plant based meat is made from pea protein or or wheat gluten proteins or

Um you know, they've got coconut fat and and, you know, different vegetable fat. So Was that you was that what you were doing? You were squeezing these different components onto a I don't know, a piece of parchment paper or something and just trying to let it dry and then do another layer? Like how how are you doing it? How did you know? How do you know all the secrets? So I had this intuition that that is true, that that uh meat is comprised of muscle, fat, and blood. Yeah. And I try to to develop the the muscle, fat, and blood separately. Uh so I took soy protein, I bought in a health store, soy protein and some some pure gluten and some pea protein, and I tried to blend it with uh beetroot. And I made the fat out of coconut fat and and I took water and beetroot and some flavors like soy sauce.

And I called it blood. And then manually I I Injected layer by layer. Even one of those creations I I posted on a Facebook group of Meat Lovers and I said this is our This is my rump steak. What do you think about my rump steak? It was inedible. It it was not something you can eat. But but

When I show this to people I don't think they were excited about the technology or the levels of s sophistication. But I saw I I have some crazy ability to to follow A wide idea.

Alright, so you You and uh Adam Lahav, who is your co founder who who you had met at HP, you you decide to start this company. Um It's gonna take a lot of money and a lot of uh you know, research to get this right. You you knew something a lot about three D printing.

Um as a product manager. But you had to find, presumably you had to find Some scientists to work with. To help you start. to get something even some kind of prototype that is

You know, that you could serve to people. Where did you go? Did you start in Israel or did you did you Find a label. Somewhere else. Yeah, we did something very Israeli. We didn't have money.

So we hired young people that would help us learn something new that had an interesting background. So we hired a food engineer A three D printing guy, a maker and a chef. This was the team. Uh and it wasn't the team to crack the technology for the long term. Yeah. But it's the team to understand what are our gaps, what are we missing. And then uh th this team is amazing, they're still in the company. Uh we find found two people. One is our VP of research and development, and he's a physicist. So

Not related to food. uh but he actually knows how to take wild technological ideas and make them into reality. And the second is our is our CTO that has a background in tissue engineering. So he made meat in the lab. And then you went to three D printing. And all of these people They really, really care about the planet.

So they all eat meat. They all actually love meat. But I care about the planet and care about doing something that has an impact far beyond just technology and a business. And when we told them the story they quit really, really great jobs and joined us. That that's amazing. That's something that can happen in Israel.

uh especially when you combine technology and sustainability. So how did you make the first You know, products that you could actually test on people. I mean where like given that you had f utterly failed in twenty eighteen, not utterly, but what you made in your home was inedible. Where how did you start to

To to get it to a place where w you could actually make something that was Edible. The first thing we needed a lab. I have a friend that worked with me in HP that his family operates labs that you can rent. And they gave us a lab for almost free and and we set up shop there. And then we started just

sourcing buying every protein, every flavor compound, every fat that we can. And building a three D printer that can manipulate these products. So we we build our own printer, we build the machine from scratch. And we try to build different structures. And see how the different structure impacts your Experience, the flavor. So how this element of 3D printing

can manipulate something in food. We didn't try to make a steak, we didn't try to make something tasty. Wanted to see what kind of things we can create with three D printing. that a normal food company cannot develop. And the first thing that we developed were not Tasty.

And they were not meety? But they showed anybody from uh food science. that this is something new. This is a new property of food that we can create. By this combination of three D printing. And the different components that we had.

And and then We accelerated thing because at that point of time it was very clear. that this can become a stake one day. Yeah, it was very exciting. And we thought that that's it. That's our job is done.

We filed a patent for that. And we thought that's easy. Now only thing we need to do like six more months in a lab and then we will sell a three D printer to every restaurant around the world. The idea was you would basically the the business is gonna be the printers, not the meat. You would sell the printers to restaurants and then they could print meat. Print their own. plant based meat on on demand.

On demand, no waste, just in time. Personalize your steak. We even uh we had the habit of demoing people a steak that they would cut and their name will be inside. They couldn't eat it because it wasn't tasty. But it was very impressive that we can control the shape of the stake from the outside and from the inside. So I know that you guys raise your about six million dollars in seed funding in twenty nineteen. And that probably, you know, got you to a place where you could develop something

that was, you know, maybe ready to test on on people on meet eaters and you launched in the middle of Covid in July of twenty twenty. Um I think your first Product, the old steak. And

J just sort of explain this to me. Essentially what you were trying to do was through different layers, right? different m micro layers of pr of printing the stake. the result would be something that kind of pretty much replicated or got as close as possible to a real piece of meat with the you know that that intramuscular, that muscular kind of

um you know, the the the grain of the meat and when you cut into it there's that chewiness You essentially got As far as you could tell, it's close to that As anybody had gotten. Yeah, so at some point of time the the Citron we actually raised on the blood, just the fact that our blood component was very, very tasty and very impressive.

And the blood was basically water and s and Soy sauce and different flavors. Yeah, it was a little bit more advanced than that. We found a collaboration with a flavor company that's called Jivodan, an amazing strategic partner. And we were able to to develop this gush of blood that when you put in your mouth tastes like what comes out of steak. And we were able to show the stake and explain once we combine those together. You'll have this experience of biting through fibers and having juiciness created. That was the seed round.

And then when when we in Covid when before we launch we did this large scale tasting. So we gave one about one thousand people in two days blind tasting of some products, some were minced meat, so some were not using additive manufacturing, but it was the first time we gave people a stake. Uh and it was very, very encouraging to see consumer reaction

kids uh I remember there's a nice video of a mother giving her kid a a bite of her product. And then I told her, you know, it's made from plants from uh the steak, actually the steak. And she told me, Don't tell him what is an actual steak. He doesn't know what he's eating. And of course investors saw That it's not only a technological promise of of Patents in a mush.

It's something that people are now starting to eat. And get excited about it. And then we we raised more money and also started working more more with chefs. Once we were more confident, we started going to this mission and star chefs and butchers. Um, I want to ask you about that in a sec, but you basically sounds like you abandoned this plan to sell three D printers.

original concept you kind of pivoted and said, No, let's just focus on making the meat and selling the meat. Yeah, it was a big pivot, but it happened in one minute. That basically created a new More like a business aspiration to the company. Uh we were speaking with one of the largest beef companies in the world with the management team. And we had a presentation about our technology and what we're doing and they asked me so how can we collaborate?

And I told him, you know, actually we don't want to collaborate with you, we want to be you. And they said, What do you mean? We told them, Yeah, we want to be the world's largest meat company. And they stopped and they applauded. They say okay, that's the way of thinking. And when we came out to this meeting we started saying to everybody, we're going to become the world's biggest meat company. This is this is what we're going to do. And if you're the world biggest meat company, you're not selling the technology, you're selling meat.

We're gonna take another short break, but when we come back, more from Eschhar on his goal to make Redefine Meat the largest meat company in the world. Stay with us, I'm Guy Raz, and you're listening to how I built this lab. Welcome back to How I Built This Lab. I'm Guy Raz. My guest today is Eshhar Ben Shitri, who realized the best way to grow his plant-based meat company. Is to work with people who know a lot about food. a as you started to get more attention, you

Eventually developed. A partnership with two really famous chefs, both uh Michelin starred chefs, Marco Pierre White and Ron Blau. Um Mark up here white. from Britain, very, very famous chef, um and I saw him do a do a video um saying that the first time he tried it he he was kinda blown away.

Well the first thing I wanted to to understand was the construction of it. And so I snapped it. And I taste it. It reminded me of

raised cheek of beef. I thought this is genius. I did say It's Most clever thing I've ever seen. In my forty five years of being in the kitchen.

Mm. And and I should add, I've tried it. It's Actually amazing. It it it tastes

These guys, you know, get a lot of uh I mean, there's a lot of plant based meat products out there and there's a lot of competition. It's a very competitive space. And even The idea of getting shelf space in the supermarket just seems daunting. How did you convince them to try this. I mean, someone like Marco Pierre White has these gets gets pitched every day.

So How did you how did you get to him a a small, you know company based in in outside Tel Aviv. going to him and saying, Hey, try this. How how'd you do that?

Uh I I think there are are two reasons. One is humility. So in in plant based meat, there's a lot of companies, including some of my friends, I say we have a perfect replacement for meat. You have the same texture, the same flavor, the same everything that you expect from meat. And then you take a bite and you see what is the distance. So we say meat is incredible. Meet is so amazing, it's been developed through, you know, millions of years of evolution. So assuming that we are already there We're not there. Uh the passion to really listen.

So when we came to Marco Pierre White, when we came to Ron Blau, by the way very early on in the process We told him take a bite. Tell us what's wrong in this product. Don't tell us how amazing it is, let's start selling it in in all of your restaurants. just be a partner on making this really great. And we did it with them, but we also went to butchers. We also went to the people that know intimately this connection between meat and the consumer.

And we we told him, just tell us the honest truth. Not only Mar by the way, Marco is incredible, he's also poetic, and and he has this philosophy around the world. Ron It's breeding in combining flavor. But every cook in every catering that we work with has a lot of criticism on our product and we listen. We don't say no no.

You're m mistaken? We say, Okay, maybe in the next version. We actually need to add some more bite and some more fat and to make the flavors more natural. constantly trying to You're not you're not saying this is the final product that we sell now.

Uh what what what I tried, what was available this this kind of short rib really had that chewyness and that bite and And it was like ninety five percent there. You know, it was really close. Um, and I'd never tasted anything that that was like that. It was a plant based product. So But you're you're basically saying we're not, you know

We're we might be fifty percent the way there. Already right now. Yeah, and also meat is so diverse and even beef, think about beef. You eat not only short trip and maybe you don't like short trib or you happen to like short trip, but what about the tender loan, the rebuy? What about a very fatty

Marbly by what about very lean cut of skirt steak that is very bloody. So meat is not a single product. Beef is not a product. Beef is a world of different cultures Different supply chains. And and they are all complicated and they're all tasty. And all have different consumers that want them. By the way, you know what's the problem with the dish that you ate? The product was meant to be a steak. We wanted people to serve it as a steak and not to take it into short rip.

But it it performs really well there. So the next version of that was how we are not only doing this fibriness, chewyness of short rib. But how can the product stands alone? On the plate.

Yeah. I mean knowing what you know about about this technology, right, how how how long will it take, do you think? Before you can create. A fully plant based steak. that is indistinguishable from a uh an animal stake.

The question is more what is the benchmark. So today if we do a blind taste into all of our products, we can choose a an okay meat including a steak, that consumers will not tell the difference. But the problem is that if you go to a steakhouse, the steakhouse where we are served, we we're uh in a place called Beef Bar in multiple countries around the world. And the before serves wagyu meat, so the highest priced meat super premium meat, yeah. Yeah, so of course we cannot compete in a blind tasting, and we want. We believe that in three years from now we can also provide a wag U beef with the same level of marbling, the same level of tenderness and and richness of flavor.

So that is our aim. Our aim is to constantly increase the benchmark of How do we compete? So Israeli beef Actually OK one is not the best in the world. In many cases, especially high tech companies that we work with they substitute meat with redefined meat. They say the meat that we buy, your meat is already even better. Of course much more healthy and much more sustainable.

But when we go to France, for example. the the beef there and and the way people consume beef, even a b burger in in France is a ste cachet, not eaten in a bun, eaten with a knife and fork. So it's more difficult to compete with our burger that is is better than some of the burgers that are served in Israel. in a meat restaurant. So that that is the real focus. The real focus is is how do you find a benchmark? that every time uh that our product improves

Addresses much more consumers. So angus steak, which is let's say We're not there yet. Once we have an Angus Tech and Angus rebuy, which is a year from now. We can go to US mainstream stakeholders.

At what point will will these products be available in grocery stores? Eventually, in order to become the world biggest meat company, we need to be everywhere that meat is found. But we think that the way to reach consumers and the way to improve our products is through restaurants. So as we improve our product and we improve our scale. we start to sell more and more to consumers directly. In Israel we're already there. So in Israel you can buy a range of our product in basically every store. Uh and in Europe it will take a little bit more time. First we're still building

the recognition of our quality and and the value of what we're bringing in restaurants and we have a lot more work to do. And we've been in capacity because it's a new technology. And we develop our own formulations and products and also machinery. And it takes us time and it takes money. And we have a lot of demand for our products and not enough capacity. So we rather work with the Michelin Star restaurant and the caterers.

Somewhere next year, a year from now we'll start rolling out to more retailers in Europe. Yeah, with the products including our stakes. Uh and then gradually grow until we reach also to the USA and then follow the same path. First restaurants, then retail. And what about price point? I mean right now I i is it i is the price of a Uh of a redefined meat steak.

Comparable to A quality stake or is it is it higher? It's comparable to high quality steak and the quality is not there yet. So it's it's a little bit a premium for uh The the relative level of quality.

Because the value that we bring is not just the price. So when people consume really fine meat they want to experience something that doesn't come from an animal, that is more sustainable, that is more healthy. uh and they're willing to pay a small premium, not huge, it's not double the price, it's about twenty, thirty percent more expensive. And we have limited capacity. Uh actually our cost of ingredients, so the the cost of our input, unlike meat, is very low. Because uh meat cows consume about twenty five kilograms of feed for every cal kilogram

And we actually use about thirty percent of ingredient to make a kilo of meat and the rest is water. So on that regard we're very efficient. Because we operate in a small scale, everything related to automation, to packaging, uh to capital equipment is inefficient. As we grow with that, we'll become cheaper in our production and we can lower the the price.

And We we can easily become at small scale. Cheaper than meat. And meat today has massive scale, massive trillions of dollars of scale. And we're talking about tens of millions of dollars.

to reach a relatively decent scale. A lower price point. Let me ask you a a business related question. I mean, you've raised a lot of money. This is a capital intensive product. I think you've raised if if I'm right, close to two hundred million dollars now in in several rounds of fundraising. Um but I have I have to imagine there's a

You've got a ways to go before you're gonna I mean maybe Maybe ten years. Uh no, so w we're very lucky. We invest a lot in technology and our technology is very, very complicated.

But we chose a very simple set of ingredients. That allowed us with a new technology to reach Good scale and revenue quite fast. So we're actually selling and uh on the individual level product we are profitable. The key is how much scale we need to be profitable as a company and how much we want to invest in future technology.

And by being in the market and growing every month. and investing in technology, we can increase the addition the the addressable market that we have. So it's not ten years, it's two years from now. So in in You know In sort of five years from now.

Where do you want to be? Where where do you imagine you'll be? In five years from now, we're already a big meat company. Uh we have a presence in Europe in basically every restaurant. that you can imagine because food service is a market that we dominate and we are in all the nationwide retailers with our mean range and our stake. And we have sizable business in the USA from restaurants in in retail. But the idea is is

If you look even ten years from now. Out of the twenty biggest meat companies around the world One company or two company for sure will not rely on animals. This I have no doubt. And we want to be the first one to reach there.

To have A meat business That is the distribution of meat that is found everywhere, that consumers enjoy the product that are very healthy and very sustainable. Like a meat company? Without

The animal. That is slaughter. And it's a very, very challenging task because the big meat companies have been around for one hundred years. But some point of time meat companies will not rely on animals. And the question is who's going to do it? Somebody has to do it. We don't have a choice. It's it's inevitable in the sense that the plant needs it and animal need it and human need it.

Uh and I don't see a lot of companies that have this ambition. Because it's really tough. It's really it's it's a tough journey. to do what we're doing. But but the potential is so amazing. The potential is so unique, so incredible. It's something we we would tell our grandkids about. So this this is what drives us. And five years from now is just the beginning. So we we started six years ago, five years from now is eleven years in. for for the world's biggest meat company, it's just the beginning. Eshgar Ben Shit, thanks so much.

Thank you, guy. I enjoy it a lot and thank you. It's it's an honor. Ash har ben she treat. Co-founder and CEO of Redefine Meat. Hey, thanks so much for listening to the show this week. Please make sure to click follow on your podcast app so you never miss a new episode. And as always, it's totally free. This episode was produced by Carrie Thompson and edited by John Isabella, with research help from Chris Massini and music by Rum Team Erably. Our production team at How I Built This includes Neva Grant, Casey Herman,

JC Howard, Alex Chung, Elaine Coates, Carla Estevez, Ramel Wood, and Sam Paulson. Our audio engineer was Gilly Moon. I'm Guy Roz and you've been listening to how I built this lab.

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