• Partner With Us
  • Focus Areas
    • Cause Selection
    • Global Health & Wellbeing
      • Abundance & Growth
      • Effective Giving & Careers
      • Farm Animal Welfare
      • Global Aid Policy
      • Global Health & Development
      • Global Health R&D
      • Global Public Health Policy
      • Scientific Research
    • Global Catastrophic Risks
      • Biosecurity & Pandemic Preparedness
      • Forecasting
      • Global Catastrophic Risks Capacity Building
      • Potential Risks from Advanced AI
    • Other Areas
      • History of Philanthropy
  • Grants
  • Research & Updates
    • Blog Posts
    • In the News
    • Research Reports
    • Notable Lessons
  • About Us
    • Grantmaking Process
    • How to Apply for Funding
    • Careers
    • Team
    • Operating Values
    • Stay Updated
    • Contact Us
  • Partner With Us
  • Focus Areas
    • Cause Selection
    • Global Health & Wellbeing
      • Abundance & Growth
      • Effective Giving & Careers
      • Farm Animal Welfare
      • Global Aid Policy
      • Global Health & Development
      • Global Health R&D
      • Global Public Health Policy
      • Scientific Research
    • Global Catastrophic Risks
      • Biosecurity & Pandemic Preparedness
      • Forecasting
      • Global Catastrophic Risks Capacity Building
      • Potential Risks from Advanced AI
    • Other Areas
      • History of Philanthropy
  • Grants
  • Research & Updates
    • Blog Posts
    • In the News
    • Research Reports
    • Notable Lessons
  • About Us
    • Grantmaking Process
    • How to Apply for Funding
    • Careers
    • Team
    • Operating Values
    • Stay Updated
    • Contact Us

Impossible Foods — R&D Investment

Visit Grantee Site
  • Portfolio Area: Alternatives to Animal Products
  • Focus Area: Farm Animal Welfare
  • Category: Global Health & Wellbeing
  • Portfolio Area: Other Scientific Research Areas
  • Organization Name: Impossible Foods
  • Award Date: November 2016

Table of Contents

    The Impossible Burger. (Photo courtesy of Impossible Foods)

    Published: March 2017

    Impossible Foods staff reviewed this page prior to publication.

    The Open Philanthropy Project has invested in Impossible Foods (IF) to accelerate the development of plant-based meats.

     

    Limited disclosure

    IF asked us not to disclose a number of important pieces of information related to this investment because IF is a for-profit, privately held startup company with a significant portfolio of intellectual property. Therefore, we have not gone into as much detail as we otherwise would.

    In particular, we agreed with IF not to publicly disclose the terms of the investment, which products we have seen or tasted at IF’s headquarters, or any information about specific scientific and technical challenges that IF’s team is working to overcome.

    Background

    The Open Philanthropy Project invested in IF as part of our work on farm animal welfare.

    IF is a Silicon Valley-based technology startup that develops meat directly from plants. IF launched its first product, the Impossible Burger, in July 2016. The Impossible Burger is now on the menu of eleven restaurants across the U.S. IF is constructing a factory in California that, when fully ramped up in the second half of 2017, will increase supply of the Impossible Burger to restaurants throughout the United States.

    While in the near term IF remains focused on the successful commercialization of the Impossible Burger as its flagship product, IF’s longer-term plans include development and commercialization of additional plant-based products to compete with all the foods that today are produced using animals in all major regions globally.

    Since its founding in 2011, IF’s team of scientists has done advance research and development (R&D) on different products including ground and whole-cut beef, pork, chicken, fish, and dairy and cheese products. With our new investment, we hope to accelerate the development and commercialization of a second wave of plant-based foods, enabling IF to expand from the Impossible Burger to additional product categories.

    Case for investment

    In rough outline, we arrived at a decision to make this investment as follows:

    1. Farm animal welfare is one of our focus areas. We specifically wanted to invest in people who are working on plant-based alternatives to chicken, eggs and fish because very large numbers of animals are negatively affected by current practices related to producing these foods.
    2. We have chosen not to prioritize investment in R&D for cultured meat, especially for whole-cut meat (i.e. not ground meat) because we believe technical tractability is currently low (particularly with respect to getting costs acceptably low).
    3. We were interested in someone using a bioengineering-based approach, analogous to what IF has done with the Impossible Burger, to develop plant-based alternatives to chicken, eggs, and fish. We were particularly interested in IF’s approach based on:
      1. our Scientific Advisor Chris Somerville’s opinion that Pat Brown (IF’s Founder and CEO) is an outstanding scientist;
      2. a belief that technical barriers to a viable, low-cost product in this area are much smaller than technical barriers to developing whole-cut cultured meat;
      3. a belief that more science-heavy/bioengineering-oriented approaches were more likely to yield a transformative product than other attempts to develop plant-based alternatives;
      4. a taste test of the Impossible Burger, which we believe is a promising product.
    4. We were aware of the Impossible Burger and IF’s investments from venture capital firms, Google Ventures, Bill Gates and others. We decided to ask IF if it would be interested in working on whole-cut chicken in particular, or whether it could help us find someone else to work on chicken.
    5. IF told us that it could apply an investment to accelerate its work on the development of specific food categories. IF presented us with several scenarios in which the IF teams would work on one or more food categories.
    6. After a review of IF’s long-term product plan, interviews with key scientists and executives, and reviews with our financial advisors, we opted for an investment with the intention of accelerating the development of multiple food categories.
    7. We agreed informally with IF’s senior executives that IF would use Open Philanthropy’s investment to accelerate commercialization of multiple food categories.

      Plans for follow-up

      We hope that our investment will accelerate the development and commercialization of key products by a few years. We plan to meet with IF every 6 to 12 months over the next two years to check on IF’s progress.

      Key questions for follow-up include:

      • Is IF’s work toward the development of new categories of plant-based meat proceeding according to schedule?
      • How much scientific effort is directed toward each new food category? Is that in line with plans?
      • How much progress has been made on technical challenges or other potential roadblocks to commercialization?
      • Did IF’s cost of production per pound of ground beef decrease as anticipated?

    Related Items

    • Alternatives to Animal Products

      SJS Inc. — Market Shaping for Alternative Proteins (2024)

      Open Philanthropy recommended a grant of $300,000 to SJS Inc. to support its work to test a market-shaping approach to promoting alternative proteins.  Market shaping involves working with...

      Read more
    • Alternatives to Animal Products

      The Good Food Institute — General Support (2024)

      Open Philanthropy recommended a grant of $5,300,000 to the Good Food Institute for general support, including its work promoting plant-based alternatives to animal products. This follows our September...

      Read more
    • Alternatives to Animal Products

      The Good Food Institute Asia Pacific — Alternative Protein Nutrition Gaps Research

      Open Philanthropy recommended a grant of $22,500 to the Good Food Institute Asia Pacific to support their work to identify research gaps in improving the nutritional profile...

      Read more
    Back to Grants Database
    Open Philanthropy
    Open Philanthropy
    • We’re Hiring!
    • Press Kit
    • Governance
    • Privacy Policy
    • Stay Updated
    Mailing Address
    Open Philanthropy
    182 Howard Street #225
    San Francisco, CA 94105
    Email
    info@openphilanthropy.org
    Media Inquiries
    media@openphilanthropy.org
    Anonymous Feedback
    Feedback Form

    © Open Philanthropy 2025 Except where otherwise noted, this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 International License.

    We use cookies on our website to give you the most relevant experience by remembering your preferences and repeat visits. By clicking “Accept All”, you consent to the use of ALL the cookies. However, you may visit "Cookie Settings" to provide a controlled consent.
    Cookie SettingsAccept All
    Manage consent

    Privacy Overview

    This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.
    Necessary
    Always Enabled
    Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. These cookies ensure basic functionalities and security features of the website, anonymously.
    CookieDurationDescription
    cookielawinfo-checkbox-analytics11 monthsThis cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Analytics".
    cookielawinfo-checkbox-functional11 monthsThe cookie is set by GDPR cookie consent to record the user consent for the cookies in the category "Functional".
    cookielawinfo-checkbox-necessary11 monthsThis cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookies is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Necessary".
    cookielawinfo-checkbox-others11 monthsThis cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Other.
    cookielawinfo-checkbox-performance11 monthsThis cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Performance".
    viewed_cookie_policy11 monthsThe cookie is set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin and is used to store whether or not user has consented to the use of cookies. It does not store any personal data.
    Functional
    Functional cookies help to perform certain functionalities like sharing the content of the website on social media platforms, collect feedbacks, and other third-party features.
    Performance
    Performance cookies are used to understand and analyze the key performance indexes of the website which helps in delivering a better user experience for the visitors.
    Analytics
    Analytical cookies are used to understand how visitors interact with the website. These cookies help provide information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc.
    Advertisement
    Advertisement cookies are used to provide visitors with relevant ads and marketing campaigns. These cookies track visitors across websites and collect information to provide customized ads.
    Others
    Other uncategorized cookies are those that are being analyzed and have not been classified into a category as yet.
    SAVE & ACCEPT