Do you prefer plant-based meats but miss the savory, melt-in-your-mouth flavor of animal fat?
Yali Biosciences Inc. is trying to solve this very problem. The San Francisco startup is developing plant-based fats that mimic the taste, texture and chemical properties of animal fats — with far less impact on the environment. Yali plans to offer them to developers of plant-based meats to use in place of coconut oil, which such companies largely depend on today.
"We believe there is a substantial market opportunity for better functioning fats with a smaller environmental footprint," Edward Shenderovich, a managing partner at Yali backer Essential Capital, said in a news release last week.
Shenderovich and Essential backed up their belief in Yali's potential with an investment, leading the startup's $3.9 million seed round. The company plans to use the new funds to expand its research, operations and business development teams, according to its press release.
Here's more on Yali's round and other seed funding news from the past week:
Orkes Inc., Cupertino, $9.3 million: Battery Ventures and Vertex Ventures co-led the round for this provider of a cloud-hosted service used to manage and coordinate software processes. Angel investors Mahendra Ramsinghani and Gokul Rajaram also invested.
Fast Break Labs Inc., San Francisco, $6 million: Patron and Pantera Capital led the round for this cryptocurrency startup that focuses on sports video games. Collab+Currency, Solana Ventures, South Park Commons, Blue Pool Capital, Marc Merill, Aneel Ranadive, Ryan Spoon, John Robinson, Thomas Vu, Jason Choi and Wengie Huang also invested.
Calyptia Inc., San Francisco, $5 million: Sierra Ventures and Carbide Ventures co-led the round for this provider of data processing and management software.
Testsigma Technologies Inc. (dba Testsigma), San Francisco, $4.6 million: Accel and STRIVE co-led the round for this developer of web and mobile application testing software. Boldcap Ventures, Shanmugam Krishnasamy, Kiran Darisi, Parsuram Vijayasankar, Vetri Vellore, Nitesh Banta and Ioann Fainsilber also invested.
Signadot Inc., San Mateo, $4 million: Redpoint Ventures led the round for this provider of a software testing service. Y Combinator, Adam Gross, Jason Warner, John Kodumal, Timothy Chen and Chris Golda also participated.
Yali Biosciences Inc., San Francisco, $3.9 million: Essential Capital led the round for this developer of plant-derived fats for use with plant-based meat and dairy products. Third Kind Venture Capital, S2G Ventures, CRCM Ventures, FTW Ventures and First-in Ventures also invested.
Gesund Inc., San Francisco, $2 million: 500 Global led the round for this developer of a service for applying machine learning models to health care while maintaining privacy.
