Cellva pivoted from cultivated fat to cocoa-free chocolate brewed from coffee waste

Industrial biotech selling CoffeeCoa, an upcycled cocoa alternative made from coffee husks, to bakeries, chocolate processors and food companies.

Coffee and cocoa share flavor compounds, so a microencapsulated extract from wasted coffee husks can replace up to 70% of cocoa at 30% less cost.

R$28.5M (~$5.4M) raised in total, including a R$20M (~$3.8M) pre-Series A in March 2026 led by DigiBoard with Air Capital.

Founded in São Paulo in 2022 by co-founder and CEO Sérgio Pinto, Cellva originally worked on cultivated pork fat before pivoting to upcycled ingredients, with cocoa-free chocolate as the first commercial target.

CoffeeCoa was unveiled at the Future Food-Tech Summit in San Francisco on March 13, 2025. By then Cellva had over $1M in committed interest contracts from B2B clients, worth more than 80 tonnes a year. In March 2026 it raised a R$20M (~$3.8M) pre-Series A led by DigiBoard, taking total funding to R$28.5M (~$5.4M), to move from tech validation to industrial-scale execution.

Still building toward scale: already supplying CoffeeCoa to industrial bakery manufacturers, chocolate processors and food companies in Brazil, with commercial discussions underway in Europe, Asia and the US.

Record cocoa prices gave manufacturers a concrete financial reason to trial a cheaper substitute with comparable sensory qualities.

Brazil is the world's largest coffee producer and its husks are a barely used waste stream, making raw material cheap and traceable near origin.

CoffeeCoa sells into food and nutraceutical markets at once — antioxidants and fiber give it a functional-health story beyond price.

Committed contracts of over $1M arrived before industrial production, de-risking the scale-up the new funding pays for.

When the deep-tech goal is years away, the platform you built may have a nearer-money application. A pivot that keeps the technology and swaps the market can be the actual business.

As of March 2026 Cellva is scaling its industrial biotech platform with the R$20M pre-Series A: building a manufacturing facility in Bahia with an experienced operating partner, refining distribution agreements across Latin America, supplying Brazilian bakery and chocolate processors, and advancing commercial discussions with clients in Europe, Asia and the US.