eniferBio raises €11 million ($12.1M) to make fungal protein

With the freshly raised round of funding, the company will begin to scale up the production of its PEKILO® mycoprotein powder to thousands of tons per year and seek Novel Food approval from the EU and other markets.

eniferBio has already partnered with big global companies in the feed and food industries, such as Skretting, the global aquafeed division of Nutreco, Purina for pet food, and Valio for consumer food products.

What is fungal protein?

eniferBio uses by-products of food and agricultural processes to create its PEKILO® mycoprotein powder. Through a special fermentation process, this powder can be used in pet food and aquafeed.

The production process is efficient, uses very little water, doesn’t require large land areas, and does not cause eutrophication like traditional agriculture. As it has a lower carbon footprint than soybean, the company claims to have a sustainable alternative for the European market that is heavily reliant on imported soybeans.

Plans for the pet industry

Simo Ellilä, CEO of eniferBio, shares its plans for the pet industry: “In the coming year, we intend to expand testing of our product in pet food and hopefully carry out a first limited test marketing campaign.”

Depending on the raw materials used, the mycoprotein produced can have a use case for different industries. There are plenty of opportunities where pet food would be the most obvious market:

“To give you an example, we’ve been discussing [with] whiskey distilleries about their by-product streams and how those could be converted into fungal protein. The volumes are not big enough to support aquafeed production, but making pet food from your favorite whiskey brands leftovers might be an excellent idea (and a good story to boot).”

eniferBio was founded in 2020 by 5 scientists who participated in Purina’s Unleashed Accelerator in 2022.