Food for business and the future with Genopole incubatee Ynsect

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Food for business and the future with Genopole incubatee Ynsect

When they joined Genopole in March 2014, Ynsect had already secured a €1.8m series A funding which was to be increased with another €5.5m series B funding just 8 months later. The financial success of the company is as high as were their vision and ambitions when they founded their company in 2011 and their funding reaches now a total of $ 425 million.

Ynsect is a pioneer in “insect biotech”. The company develops technologies for the high-scale production and transformation of insects, to provide high quality and high value products, in the field of nutrition and green chemistry.

Supported by BpiFrance through the “Worldwide Innovation Challenge”, Ynsect owns the world’s largest private insect research center. Ynsect develops products and services through its YnFarmTM technology platform. It consists of an insect biorefinery, which combines an insect production unit, and a downstream process unit. The first products resulting from this platform are high quality protein and oils for animal nutrition, and chitin derivatives for fine chemicals and biomaterials.

When the EFSA (EU Food Safety Agency) officially declared mid-January 2021 that the mealworm is safe for human consumption, Ynsect who is now Europe’s best-funded insect-farming business could immediately see the positive and exciting impact it would have on the edible insect market and they are now taking all the appropriate measures to boost their mainstream mealworm product, Ynmeal.

But the challenge lies more in the changes of mentality than in the market itself. Even if already used in the agriculture sector and though scientists and researchers clearly see the added value of a product that could easily feed large populations and solve many environmental problems linked to food production (up to 75% less carbon and 50% less water as livestock farming), average consumer seems unprepared yet to order a bunch of crickets for dinner.

First to be sold into the global sports nutrition market as a technical ingredient or in food products containing mealworm powder, the start-up is building its second production plan on the outskirts of Paris in forecast of a 50% rise by 2030 for the development of new products meant for everyday human consumption. Their farm is the first carbon negative and largest vertical farm in the world and will be operational by early 2022 generating 500 new jobs.

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