The Founder, capitalising on food safety scandals in China and Southeast Asia, said he ‘wants to grow much deeper in Asia than we already are’
Image credit: Pietro Izzo / Flickr
San Francisco-based Hampton Creek, a food technology startup that ‘focusses on identifying plants that can be used to make food healthier, more sustainable, and more affordable’, has yesterday raised US$90 million in Series C funding led by existing investors Horizons Ventures (based in Hong Kong) and Khosla Ventures.
The funds will be used to accelerate distribution efforts, as well as to improve R&D into its plant-based egg replacement technology — the very technology that has made it a world-renowned brand.
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A key focus will be on expanding deeper into Asian markets, with the three-year-old startup already having inked deals with PARKnSHOP, Hong Kong’s largest grocery chain, in just the past months.
Markets like China that are constantly being hit by food safety scandals will likely be fast to adopt plant-based alternatives to egg protein, which carry none of the risks attached to poultry products.
“We have distribution with some of the largest food companies in the world, and we’ve got to produce. We want to make sure we’re not holding back. We want to grow much deeper in Asia than we already are,” Joshua Tetrick, Founder and CEO, Hampton Creek said yesterday in an interview with Business Insider.
Hampton creek plans to bring to market next year an eggless pasta named Just Pasta, and a scrambled egg replacement called Just Scrambled.
Wired commented on the startup’s Asia focus:
Ping Li, a partner with Silicon Valley Venture Capital firm Accel Partners, says this sort of Asian focus isn’t the norm for Silicon Valley companies and other US-based startups—Silicon Valley is still the “epicenter” of the VC world, he says—but the thinking behind the company’s latest funding round makes good sense.
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This latest Series C round brings the startup’s total raised capital to date to US$120 million. It previously raised US$23 million in Series B funding in February this year.
Hampton Creek’s presence in Asian markets is set to become an integral part of its global strategy to make food healthier ‘for everyone, everywhere’.
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