A brand new startup goals to alter how meals is preserved and saved, utilizing tech that retains meat, fish and produce flavorful at subzero temperatures.
“Greater than a 3rd of the meals that we produce now’s simply wasted or misplaced in a roundabout way. That has rather a lot to do with the best way that we retailer meals and the best way we protect it,” mentioned Paul Levins, co-founder of EverCase, which introduced its debut in June.
EverCase’s tech can maintain meals supple, stopping it from turning right into a frozen block at temperatures as little as -12 levels Celsius, in keeping with firm research. Its meals instances will be tailored to protect every part from complete fish to steaks and berries, and so they can match inside normal freezers.
The 8-person startup has roots in Seattle and operations within the metropolis. Levins and CEO and co-founder Chris Somogyi beforehand have been executives at Mental Ventures spinout Xinova, which helped match inventor concepts with clients and shut down final 12 months.
Somogyi later based BlueNalu, a startup that markets fish merchandise grown in cell tradition.
Somogyi additionally took a job as enterprise growth lead at Xerox subsidiary PARC, a fabled Silicon Valley analysis and growth firm recognized for serving to to develop laser printing, Ethernet and graphical consumer interfaces. That’s the place the concept for EverCase started to develop.
Somogyi was intrigued by know-how being developed by Soojin Jun, a professor on the College of Hawaii and an EverCase co-founder. Jun’s meals processing laboratory research methods of preserving meals by supercooling it.
When meals freezes, ice crystals harm mobile constructions. That’s why a frozen steak tastes like, properly, frozen steak. It’s additionally why liquid oozes from it after thawing.
Jun developed a method of stopping the water in meals from forming ice crystals at low temperatures. His machine applies electrical and magnetic fields to meals to allow it to withstand ice formation whereas being cooled.
Researchers have for years carried out experiments suggesting that electrical fields can have an effect on how ice kinds. The explanation for the impact just isn’t absolutely understood, although water molecules have a optimistic cost at one finish and a detrimental one on the opposite, and so react to electrical fields. Research additionally present that magnetic fields, mysteriously, additionally impact ice formation in meals.
“It is a actually lively space of analysis,” mentioned Will Cantrell, a professor of physics at Michigan Technological College who research ice formation within the ambiance.
Jun’s tech was introduced into PARC, which offered seed funding and pulled in further mental property. The staff can now harness electrical and magnetic fields to chill meals to temperatures decrease than different programs, mentioned Levins. In addition they overcame a earlier limitation of the know-how that required electrodes to be in bodily contact with meals.
“There are approaches utilizing very excessive power pure electrical fields. We desire to have low energy and excessive security approaches, and suppleness with format and simple hand-off throughout the chilly chain nodes,” mentioned Somogyi, who has a background in bioengineering and relies in Wimberley, Texas.
Somogyi mentioned he didn’t know of different startups targeted on related know-how, although he famous that giant corporations corresponding to Daikin and Siemens are concerned in conventional refrigeration.
Bringing such know-how as much as an industrial scale brings additional challenges, mentioned Cantrell. The energy of electromagnetic fields wanes with distance from its supply. However making it work is probably extremely worthwhile, he mentioned. “You can lengthen shelf life and you may lengthen the attain of your delivery,” he mentioned. Perishable merchandise like berries is also out there past their regular season.
After testing out greater than 20 prototypes, EverCase has a system able to take to market. Firm research present that their instances can forestall ice crystal formation in meals at temperatures between -4 and -12 levels Celsius.
The EverCase staff is at the moment scoping out customized programs for early clients. The potential buyer base consists of meals producers and shippers.
“We get all the identical advantages of freezing whereas sustaining high quality and texture,” mentioned Levins. “It would disrupt the chilly provide chain.” And the corporate also can make a dent in meals waste, he mentioned.
As well as, the system has potential to be tailored to tissue or organs, added Levins, who relies in Sydney, Australia.
Charlotte Guyman, a former Microsoft exec and Berkshire Hathaway director, is a Seattle-based advisory board member for EverCase. The corporate additionally has operations in Australia and Spain and is elevating a Sequence A spherical.