What the business is
Meatable grew real pork from animal stem cells without slaughter: a patented pluripotent-stem-cell process running in perfusion bioreactors at its Leiden facility, aimed at food brands and Singapore-style regulatory beachheads.
The bet
That pork grown from pluripotent stem cells — muscle and fat in four days — could reach regulatory approval and cost-competitive production before the money ran out.
Starting capital
~$95M raised (Green Queen); €85.3M per Tracxn via EU-Startups, incl. a €29.8M round led by Agronomics (Aug 2023); €7.6M Dutch RVO innovation credit (2024); Agronomics' £7.9M stake written to zero
How it started
Founded in 2018 by Krijn de Nood, Daan Luining and Mark Kotter, betting that pluripotent stem cells — not immortalised cell lines — were the right raw material for scaled, slaughter-free pork (Green Queen).
What happened
Singapore approval via ESCO Aster (2022) made it the first approved cultivated-pork producer; the EU's first public tasting followed in Apr 2024, Time listed it among 2024's best inventions, and May 2025 brought US meat veteran Jeff Tripician in as CEO. In 2025 it bought Uncommon Bio's platform, partnered with TruMeat on a Singapore factory and Pelagen on cell-based leather — while its ~$35M Series C stalled.
How it ended up
On Dec 19, 2025 shareholder Agronomics announced the wind-down: Meatable 'was unable to obtain continued funding from either existing shareholders or from new investors.' Agronomics' £7.9M stake was written to zero; the winding-up follows statutory liquidation procedures. It fell days after Israel's Believer Meats ceased operations (Green Queen; EU-Startups).
What has to be true
The capital tap closed sector-wide: $36M went to cultivated-meat startups in the first nine months of 2025 against $139M in all of 2024, itself down 40% (Green Queen).
No approvals, no revenue: Singapore's decision was still pending in late 2025 despite years of work, and the business could not fund itself in the interim (Green Queen).
Capital intensity outran the ~$95M raise: 200-litre bioreactors in Leiden, a planned Singapore factory and an IP acquisition all demanded cash the Series C never delivered (Green Queen; EU-Startups).
Contagion: the wind-down came days after Believer Meats ceased operations, with UK's CellRev and Dutch peer Upstream Foods also quitting in 2025 (Green Queen).
What can be applied
Deep-tech timelines are set by capital markets, not science: Meatable kept winning recognition while a sector that can't book revenue before multi-year approvals dies when appetite turns.
Aftermath
As of Dec 22, 2025 Meatable is winding down under statutory liquidation procedures, with Agronomics' stake carried at zero. The Leiden facility, the Uncommon Bio IP and cell lines, and the TruMeat Singapore plans all go into the estate. The collapse deepened a shake-out that had already claimed Believer Meats, CellRev and Upstream Foods within the year (Green Queen).
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