Mighty Mycelium

Fascinating, fruitful and underexplored fungus

A new generation of startups is trying to build sustainable businesses by making use of the efficiency of fungi to produce novel feed, food or food additives highly efficiently, and also to create biodegradable materials that can replace resource-inefficient or fossil-based products such as textile or plastics.

Fermentation technology mainly consists of two techniques: SSF is solid-based fermentation of filamentous fungi controlling environmental factors to modify the final product structure. LSF is liquid-based fungal fermentation to produce valuable compounds for various industries.

Startups highlighted in this Deep Dive fit into two industries; food and feed, and materials.