MILPITAS – VitroLabs has raised a total of $46 million in Series A financing as it continues to develop a new scientific process for growing the world’s first cellular cultivated animal leather.
The funding was led by Agronomics and other investors include Bestseller’s Invest FWD, global luxury group Kering, Khosla Ventures, actor and environmentalist Leonardo DiCaprio, New Agrarian and Regeneration.VC. In addition, Kering continues its partnership with VitroLabs in bringing support for product quality testing, tanning and finishing.
CEO Ingvar Helgason co-founded VitroLabs with the mission to create the highest quality materials that meet the uncompromising standards of the luxury industry while drastically lowering environmental impact and furthering animal welfare.
“At a time when environmental stewardship is more important than ever, biotech companies have the opportunity to lead the way in changing how we produce materials and build supply chains, working hand in hand with existing artisans and craftspeople who are the cornerstone of the $400 billion leather goods industry,” he said. “By launching the first production of cultivated leather, we’ll hit a major milestone in fulfilling our mission to lead the shift towards a more sustainable future.”
“At Kering, a pillar of our sustainability roadmap is dedicated to sustainable innovation and actively looking for alternative materials that can reduce our environmental impact which is why we are very interested in the potential of biomaterials such as cultivated leather,” said Marie-Claire Daveu, chief sustainability and institutional affairs officer at Kering.
“There has been an explosion of companies that are developing alternative materials to leather,” Helgason added. “However at VitroLabs, our cultivated animal leather preserves the biological characteristics that the industry, craftsmen and consumers know and love about leather, while eliminating the most environmentally and ethically detrimental aspects of the conventional leather manufacturing process associated with its sourcing.”
Since 2016, the company has been pioneering the cutting edge material made by using advanced tissue engineering processes to create cell cultivated animal leather from only a few animal cells. The company has made significant progress on product quality in the optimisation of cell expansion processes and proprietary design of a novel, large-scale tissue cultivator.
“Over the last two years, we have been laser-focused on pushing our tissue engineering platform in order to increase efficiency and to optimise tissue production to obtain the look, feel, and performance of traditional leather at scale,” said co-founder and stem cell scientist Dusko Ilic. “With several major breakthroughs in the areas of bioreactor design, bioprocess and facility design, and cell culture development, we are now on our way to a scalable process that delivers the desired premium qualities, forging a path towards the ultimate goal of industrialisation.”
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