Business For Good Podcast
A Whale of a Tale: Wildtype and the Future of Cultivated Seafood
by Paul Shapiro
October 15, 2022 | Episode 99
More About Justin Kolbeck and Aryé Elfenbein
Justin Kolbeck is co-founder and CEO of Wildtype, which is on a mission to create the cleanest, most sustainable seafood on the planet. Before Wildtype, he spent nearly five years as a consultant at Strategy& (not a typo!) helping companies develop and launch products, grow into new markets, and operate efficiently. Justin started his career as a Foreign Service Officer, serving in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Australia, and Washington DC. He is a graduate of the Yale School of Management, L’Institut d’Études Politiques de Paris, and UC Berkeley.
Aryé Elfenbein is co-founder of Wildtype, where he directs the company’s scientific research. Aryé completed his MD and PhD at Dartmouth and Kyoto University; he completed his clinical training in internal medicine and cardiology at Yale. Prior to Wildtype, he completed a fellowship in regenerative cardiovascular medicine research at the Gladstone Institutes / UCSF. He currently practices cardiology in the critical care setting.
Wild Type salmon that I recently enjoyed while in their San Francisco HQ.
Discussed in this episode
Our past episode with BlueNalu
New Harvest founder Jason Matheny recently became CEO of the Rand Corporation
book Clean Meat (still highly relevant!)
Bored Cow’s great chocolate milk made with Perfect Day’s animal-free whey protein
As we continue to empty the oceans, our species’ demand for fish only seems to increase. But what if we could eat all the bluefin tuna and salmon we wanted without having to harm fish and other aquatic animals?
That’s the vision that companies like Wildtype are working toward. Founded in 2016, this cultivated fish startup has raised $120 million so far and now has 60 employees who are growing real fish meat without the fish. I’ve enjoyed their product now twice, both pre-pandemic and recently, and enjoyed it both times.
Today, Wildtype is building serious cultivation capacity to help turn the tide for the oceans, and in this episode, we discuss the company’s origins, the role bird poop played, and what the company’s up to today. We even discuss the co-founders’ first company idea which they abandoned in favor of Wildtype: a redesigned Neti pot that would’ve been called The Schnozel. (They never trademarked this, so maybe one day you’ll be able to buy that Schnozel of your dreams.)
In addition to chatting about whether it’s faster and cheaper to grow fish cells compared to mammalian and avian cells, co-founders Justin and Arye open up about what impact it’s had on their personal lives to have gone from normal jobs to running their own company. We also talk about the perennial question in this industry: If the FDA gave them approval today, how soon would it be before we see Wildtype fish on restaurant menus?
Business for Good Podcast Episode 99 - WildType
Arye Elfenbein: [00:00:00] I think that there is a sense of immediacy where we can, just , really see how, how this can have such an impact.
So so soon if we, if we do things well, if we have a great product, if we Inspire the trust of our future customers if we are open about the, the ways that we create these products. And, and that's something that's just given, at least for me, a sense of purpose that that, that I've, I've just never had previously.
Paul Shapiro: Well friend here we are at episode number 99 of the Business for Good Podcast. I am so grateful to each person who has listened to and shared some of the past 98 episodes of this podcast. I hope it is doing some good in the world. [00:01:00] I'm grateful every time I get messages from folks via the website business for good podcast.com about what impact it's had on you.
Some people have said that they have invested in companies, they've heard on this show, they have bought products from these companies have applied and gotten jobs of these companies, or even started their own companies as a result of this show. And so I hope that this show continues to inspire and I'm sure that this 99th episode will certainly do that.
Now, of course, this is episode number 99, which means that we are going to have an episode 100. And I know I have been promising you, promising you that this is going to be a really big episode with a great guest and I assure. That is the case. No, I'm not gonna reveal this guest name just yet, but I promise you when it comes time for episode 100, you will not be let down.
But before we get there, let's chat about episode 99 because it is a whale of a tale. I am constantly impressed by what my friends at the Cultivated Fish Startup Wild Type are doing, and I've been watching them since the very inception of the company and I'm so glad [00:02:00] to have them on the Business for Good podcast.
Now, you know, as we continue to empty the oceans, uh, humanities demand for fish only seems to increase. But what if we could eat all the blue tuna and all the salmon we wanted without having to harm fish and other aquatic? That would be a business for good. And that is the vision of companies like Wild Type.
They were founded in 2016 and this Cultivated Fish startup has raised now 120 million so far, and it has 60 employees who are working full time to grow real fish meet. Without the fish. I've enjoyed their product twice now, both pre pandemic and more recently, and I enjoyed it both times. Today, wild type is building serious cultivation capacity to help turn the tides for our oceans.
And in this episode, we discussed the company's origins, the role that bird poop played in them and what the company is up to today. We even discussed the co-founders first company idea, which they abandoned in favor of wild type spoiler, spoiler. It was a redesigned Netty pot that would've been called the SCH nozzle.
Now they [00:03:00] never even trademarked this idea. So maybe one day you will be able to buy that SCH nozzle of your dreams. In addition to chatting about whether it's faster and cheaper to grow fish cells compared to mammalian and avian cells, co-founders Justin and RA open up about what impact it's had on their personal lives to have gone from normal jobs to now running their own company.
We also talk about the perennial question in this. If the FDA gave them approval today, how soon would it be before we would see wild type fish on restaurant menus? This is a great conversation. I really enjoyed it and I think that you will be inspired by it as well. So now I bring you wild type co-founders, Justin Colback and Arye Elfenbein.
Paul Shapiro: Justin and Arye, welcome to the Business for Good podcast.
Justin Kolbeck: Thanks so much. Thanks for having us, Paul. Hey Paul, It. Hey,
Paul Shapiro: it's really great to be chatting with you all. I am so eager to talk with you all because I feel like even though it was pretty indirect, I feel like I have [00:04:00] some. Minuscule tangential role in the founding of this company.
Sadly, I somehow missed out on the shares that were being offered to early stage employees. But Ra please, we just disclosed to people the role that I have had in this so that it can be known for the record here about you and me and how we met at the 2016 New Harvest Conference.
Arye Elfenbein: Yeah, I mean, this is arguably the, the most important part of the story is ,
Justin Kolbeck: of course.
Obviously not, not
Paul Shapiro: arguably, not
Justin Kolbeck: argu.
Arye Elfenbein: Is, is how we met. And the story was at the New Harvest conference, like you were describing in San Francisco. It was the first time that was being hosted in San Francisco, and I was so excited to be there. I'd recently moved to SF and had been walking around and meeting new people and you could just, just feel the energy you know, at the, at the venue and It was, it was a few hours in that I was sitting at a talk and I, I got a, a tap on my shoulder and I, and I turned around.
and it, and it was you. And we had never really formally [00:05:00] met before. And you know, you said, Hey I, I don't know how to say this, but probably other people are maybe a bit embarrassed to, to tell you. But there's There's a bunch of bird crap on your other shoulder. And I I, I was, I was mortified.
I, I had no idea, but also so grateful that somebody would, would just, you know, just tell me. Went to the bathroom, tried to clean it all up, and was finally able to enjoy the rest of the day. But, but this was, I think you really solidified what, you know, became a, a real friendship and, and one that was, was based on a lot of trust
Justin Kolbeck: and forged in poop, forged in poop.
Yeah,
Paul Shapiro: well,
Justin Kolbeck: you know, let, Yeah. So company .
Paul Shapiro: Yes. You were you were getting an avian microbiome here. I, I mean, you know, let me just say, why wouldn't people tell you? And I know other people saw it. I know other people saw it, but nobody said anything. And so,
Justin Kolbeck: Oh, this, this is in California. You know, people are very [00:06:00] polite in California.
Love it. Less direct than on the other coast. Let's. It was in, if it was in New York, A it would be two steps in and be like, Hey jerk, a bird poop shoulder. Take care of that . Very
Paul Shapiro: good. So obviously you were already interested a, in the space of cultivated meat, although back then, I guess people would've been calling it cultured meet cuz you were at this conference.
But what were you doing at that time? Cause you know, you were not thinking about being a entrepreneur. I don't think so. At that time, what was your profession and why did you come to this conference in the first.
Arye Elfenbein: Yeah, not, not at all. I had just finished my, my training in both internal medicine and then in cardiology on the East coast and came out to San Francisco to work at U C S F on regenerative therapeutics involving the heart particularly after heart attacks.
And you know, this, this idea of of of how we could take a lot of what we now understand about the way that cells communicate with each other. and apply that idea beyond[00:07:00] biomedicine and more specifically to address a lot of the issues with our food system is one that Justin and I had been talking about for, for years previously.
So even though I really I certainly did not think at that time that, that this would become my career. It's, it's something that I, I think. You know, a meeting like that was was really a pivotal one for me in, in starting to, to appreciate that actually this is, this is something that, that we could
Justin Kolbeck: work on.
Paul Shapiro: Cool. And Justin, what about you? Like, what were you doing? So you weren't a cardiologist. How did you first think, start thinking about cultivated meat and what were you doing?
Justin Kolbeck: Yeah, so I, you're right, I was, at the time, I'd been out of. Grad school for a few years and was working as a strategy consultant, and RA and I were tossing around a lot of ideas.
And actually he approached me about this idea the year before in, in 2015 and we kind of noodled on it. Didn't really take any action until, I think it was October [00:08:00] of 2016. When was the New Harvest? It would've been in a few months before that. Right. Probably in the summer. Yeah. Mm-hmm. . So really in October of 2016, you know, we took our first step, had our first meetings, and kind of rented our first lab bench here in San Francisco and, and got started.
So you know, for, for me, I was fascinated by this idea that we could make a form of animal protein that would have the same nutritional components and in seafood that. The name of the game, right? People I think are gravitating towards seafood away from red meat, largely because of the nutritional benefits of eating seafood without all of the drama, right?
So mercury, microplastics, antibiotics, overfishing, climate change, right? And. That I think to this day is really what gets us both out of bed.
Paul Shapiro: So with a business background, Justin, you were already familiar with the idea of founding companies. I don't know are if you were thinking about being an entrepreneur or not, but I remember you mentioning that you [00:09:00] had actually thought about other business ideas that you had prior to doing wild type and that you were thinking maybe even of going into the the Netty pot realm.
Tell
Justin Kolbeck: me about.
Arye Elfenbein: Yeah, I mean, you know, Justin and I met when, when I was in my first year of residency and, and he was in his first year of business school. And I think a, a big part of our friendship early on was just dreaming up all of these wild ideas of Just entrepreneurial journeys that, that we might have together and may maybe, you know, just looking back that maybe is not the most usual thing for you know, for friends to, to be thinking about.
But, but we took it quite seriously. And kept a running database of, of all of these ideas that, that we would, you know, pursue and and, and we'd, you know, periodically rank them. And, and one that, that ranked very highly pretty consistently was a, a total redesign. On the idea of a Neti pot, which of course has been around for, for thousands of years but we felt like was, was really due for, [00:10:00] for a refresh.
This is something that whenever I would, would recommend to, to people in my clinic when they, when they were sick. The, you know, if they could get over just how, how gross it sounded, and maybe even how gross it, you know, it is. They, they were always thankful and, and very grateful and felt like this was, this was a very, you know noninvasive therapy when, when you're feeling really congested.
Justin Kolbeck: So
Paul Shapiro: let me ask you, is, is Netty potty brand or is it just the name of this thing that you run water through your nasal passages? .
Arye Elfenbein: It's, it's a way of life. No, I mean, it's, it's
Justin Kolbeck: a it's a religion. Yeah.
Arye Elfenbein: It's, it's just the, that, the name that, that was given to, and I believe this was something that originated in, in India hundreds of years ago.
Paul Shapiro: Okay. And so how are you gonna make it better? Like, I mean, what is wrong with the current setup of a Netty pot? I mean, it seems pretty straightforward. You poured in one ostro, what comes out the other, What? What is the innovation?
Justin Kolbeck: Well, to begin with, it needed a good name. So the name was the SCH nozzle. And so [00:11:00] nice.
So, no, I mean, we thought, we thought a lot about things like ergonomics and just how to make it a lot more fun, kind of break down the gross factor associated with it. Which, you know, interestingly enough is something that we still think about now in our current role, right? Given that we're making familiar products and in kind of a new way that might seem a bit strange to people.
But I think that. Really, the big innovation is to make it look good. Something that you would be proud to have on your bathroom countertop, for example. That would also, that would also be easy. Let's just say it was like the Porsche of your bathroom appliances.
Paul Shapiro: Right? Very nice. So when you have a guest come over, they're, you're not embarrassed to have this this nozzle right on your right on
Justin Kolbeck: your sink.
Yeah. They're gonna ask you to use your sch nozz. That fit your house specifically for your sch nozzle. That seems
Paul Shapiro: like a pre covid type request that would be made
Justin Kolbeck: true. You know while, while these ideas were like, obviously a ton of fun to work on, on like Saturday mornings at coffee shops, I, I think, I think in the end we were just like, All right, well, You know, we both have, you know, [00:12:00] pretty, pretty substantial jobs that we care a lot about.
Like something would have to be pretty special to, to pull us away. But we had like modeled the thing out with Clay and, you know, had had a lot of fun with it. Nice.
Paul Shapiro: Well if you didn't trademark, you better do so now cuz somebody listening might go and start the, start the sch nozzle themselves.
Justin Kolbeck: Don't you ask for business ideas, Paul, for .
Paul Shapiro: You go there, you start the nozzle. Very cool. I, I, I would try it out. I wouldn't bother me to try it. Okay. So whose idea was it then to say, Hey, let's not do neti pots, let's do fish like Justin. Was this your thought aria? Did, did you guys come to this mutually at the same time?
Like what was the origin moment where you thought actually. This isn't something we should be doing on Saturday mornings or coffee shops. This is something that we should devote our lives to.
Arye Elfenbein: We, we came to this together. I, I think that part of the impetus was I, I was spending some time where, where I had grown up in Australia and saw.
[00:13:00] Parts of the country that, that used to be some of the most pristine rainforest in the world and is now used to raise cows. And was thinking about how all of these emerging technologies could, could maybe be used in a way that we can still eat meat but not eat animals. And realized that somebody I had worked with in my first years of grad school, Mark Post had Actually created the world's first hamburger this way, and I had no idea and reconnected with him.
And, and this was another conference that, that I went to not really knowing exactly why I was there in the Netherlands. And I remember coming back to, to the US afterwards and telling Justin about just, just how, how riveted I was by, by this idea and, and the types of people who were at this, this first conference about
What, what he. Cultured beef at that time. And it, it was, it was an idea that really stayed with us. And, and as you know, Justin had moved to, to the west coast, to, to Seattle, and I had moved here to San Francisco was an idea that we just kept coming back to. And I think that when the opportunity presented [00:14:00] to to, as Justin said, rent lab space, just down the street from where I was at the university it was, I think that was What lowered the I guess the, the activation energy to, to be able to actually get this thing started?
Justin Kolbeck: And
Paul Shapiro: Aria, I know that you still are a practicing cardiologist, but Justin, I believe you have stopped doing business consulting and are devoting yourself exclusively to wild types. So at what point did you think this is going to be my life? Like I'm gonna quit doing consulting and I'm just gonna devote myself to trying to save the oceans?
Justin Kolbeck: So let's see. So from that point in October of 2016, we, we, ra and I spent basically a year pitching ourselves. And, you know my later wife on, on this is something that was tenable. And, and, and I think for us what that meant was actually just getting in the lab and showing that we could do this, right?
Like I, I would, I used to go visit Aria at the Gladstone institute here in San Francisco. And you know, I would look at the [00:15:00] dishes of cardiomyocytes that he was culturing, and you would see these magnificent organisms down at the cellular level beating, right? So we, we could see with our own eyes that this is feasible, right?
That that's functional heart tissue. Aria made, right. The, the question was, Could this ever scale? Can this turn into a product that looks and tastes good? Is there ever going to be a market for something like this? That that's really where we spent the better part of a year on nights and weekends, kind of funded from our own savings and from our own incomes testing that out.
And it really wasn't until. You know, literally a year later in October of 2017 that I, I left my job first to kind of work on fundraising full time. Cause at some point as, as I, as you know, Paul, it gets expensive to do this kind of work and, you know, and sort of reach, reach the end of my savings at least for, for something like this.
And, you know, we needed to raise, you know, a few, a few million bucks to do it for real. So that was really the, the kind of driving impetus, at least for me, for me was, you know, once we needed to, [00:16:00] you know, actually go out and, and try to raise money on a full-time basis. Yeah. And, and one thing that I'd
Arye Elfenbein: say, you know, about continuing to practice cardiology, I think that it's, it's something that I do because it, it still feels like a like a real special privilege to be able to, to be part of people's lives and, and part of medicine in that way.
But it's maybe one night a week for, for me, you know, at this point, and particularly during the pandemic, just felt like a, a very meaningful. To do wealth type certainly has been, has, has felt like three full-time jobs. And, and I've often thought you know, if given the chance to, to do this again or pursue full-time clinical medicine this is like, you know, starting the next company with Justin is, is absolutely what, what I'd be doing and may maybe will
Justin Kolbeck: be the.
Paul Shapiro: Well I, I hope for the sake of the world that you continue trying to save the oceans. I think there's a lot of neti pots out there, but nobody has commercialized any cultivated fish yet. So I, I'm really rooting for you guys to do that. So, let's chat about why fish. Obviously Mark Post [00:17:00] had been doing what he was calling cultured beef at the time.
And then Memphis Meats, which is now upside foods, got started and they were doing some avian cells, like they're promoting their, their duck meat that they were growing. So why fish is there some advantages that nobody else was doing it? Like, why would you focus on this area where, as you pointed out earlier, most people already think of this as a healthy food.
Justin Kolbeck: Yeah. Well, since you started the puns, I mean there, there, there really was an ocean of opportunity here. You know, I, I saw a fact Just today that something like a third of our fellow citizens on this planet rely on seafood as their number one source of protein intake. So if you wanna have a huge impact on the planet, seafood is the place to start.
I think that feels kind of far away for a lot of US Americans anyway, cuz it's, unless you live on the coasts and are used to eating so food, it may not be a big part of our diets. But certainly for, for this planet, it is so that. You know, probably the main reason is that it, it gave us an opportunity to work on something with a really big, [00:18:00] far reaching impact.
The, the, the next one is, you know, Aria as a cardiologist. And I don't think we were that excited about making another sausage or another hamburger patty or something that maybe does not contribute to good health. And, and obviously, you know, as I mentioned earlier, seafood is one of the more nutritious things that we can eat.
So, you know, we felt really excited about that. And also, you know, we were certainly influence. By the, the environment in which we live, right? So here in San Francisco, up in Seattle, where I live in British Columbia and Alaska, all of that region is salmon country, right? You go hiking and you can see if you go at the right time of year, salmon returning to their sort of ancestral spawning grounds.
Unfortunately it's harder in, harder to see every year that goes by for a number of reasons. You know, drought here in California, for example, being a major one. And so, you know, this is really an opportunity for us to do something with a huge environmental. Boone and boost to biodiversity, you know, here in our backyards with a local product.[00:19:00]
So, you know, I think those were, those were some of the reasons that, that we were really drawn toward fish in the early days. Will
Paul Shapiro: you tell me if the following is true, then, So you, you're making you know, an ethical and environmental case and a health related case for culturing fish cells as opposed to mammal or avian cells.
But as far as economics go, is it actually cheap? To grow fish cells because they're coldblooded. And so you don't have to have the temperature of the cultivator as high as it would be for a warm blooded animal.
Justin Kolbeck: You know, there, there are some efficiencies,
Arye Elfenbein: Just like the one that, that you described in terms of fish being generally salmon that, that we work with more tolerant to a wider range of temperatures.
And certainly that means we don't need to warm the vessels that they grow in to the, to the same mammalian temperatures. But I think. In, especially in the early days, that was countered by the fact that so little was known about the nutrition that these fish cells required in comparison to mammalian or avian [00:20:00] species, that the, the expense was, was very quickly I'd say balanced in favor of, of something that was, was a very costly Production process.
So that's, that's true in terms of, you know, heating, but I think that it, it has taken us longer to, to understand the, the fascinating lives of, of these fish cells. In terms of, yeah.
Paul Shapiro: And. What I've read is that it takes you all about, you know, four to six weeks to grow these fish cells. Is that aligned with how long it takes to, let's say, grow chicken or pig or cow cells or shorter or, or longer?
Like how do you compare when you think about just the time that it takes to actually bring these shells, these cells to maturity?
Arye Elfenbein: It, it certainly depends on the cell type and even within the cell type, what the characteristics are of a particular cell line. So, so there's a very, very wide range. You know, some, some cells won't ever divide.
And some will divide very quickly, such as stem cells. But in general, what we've seen and, and not just, you know, [00:21:00] within our research at, at Wild Type, but I think across some of the. Companies working within seafood and, and even in academia is that these are, you know, just generally slower cells when it comes to their, their propagation or, or just their doubling time.
Paul Shapiro: Got it. Okay. So one of the things that people think about when they're in this space is what the competition is, right? And obviously this is a a, as you said, there's this notion of opportunity and. There's just a huge white space out there though. Like if you look even in the plant-based space, like right now, plant-based meat is, you know, about 1% of the total meat market, and my guess is that of plant-based meat, maybe 1% of it is plant-based seafood.
And so, I mean, it's like a rounding error on top of a rounding error. And when you look at the cultivated meat space, I, I still think the lions share of it, or really the cow share is probably in beef or maybe in in chicken. But not so much in fish. But there are [00:22:00] other companies out there that are growing fish cells, and so I, I know that you probably don't know exactly what they're doing, but how do you.
If you think about a company like Blue Nalu and we had their CEO Lou Cooper house on the show before, like how do you differ from the other companies in the cultivated fish space? Is it that you're working on salmon and they're doing some other species? Is there some technological difference? Like when you're talking to people, what is the differentiating factor for you?
Justin Kolbeck: Yeah, I think the main one is you know, unlike beef and chicken, let's say pork and Turkey, where there's basically one. You know, organism that people eat, right? A little bit mono cropped in that way, unless you're having some kind of like heritage chicken. Some from some small scale farm in seafood, there are hundreds of sea creatures that we eat, right?
And within each of those there are so many different preparations. So even within salmon, if you just take, you know what we're working on, there's what we're doing, which is a saku block of sushi grade salmon, [00:23:00] right? Which is meant for the sushi industry and paque and so forth. You've got baked filets, you've got smoked salmon, you've got smears.
You've got. Salmon filled ravioli is right. The, the list goes on and on. And each of those products have pretty different characteristics in terms of appearance and texture and and whatnot. And so I, I think where, where maybe we're a little bit different on the seafood side is that, you know, I don't think there's even one company in the world for each even maybe if we even expanded it to plant-based seafood for each type of seafood that we eat, like major seafood species on the.
So there's just a huge, huge, huge amount of, I think, opportunity on the seafood side. Like for example, I don't know anybody that's working on e for right? And that is something that we know is almost impossible to farm. Yet even in this country we eat a lot of it. And so I, I think that's, that's really how, you know, at least on the seafood side, how we think about companies differing from one another is what they chose to work on in [00:24:00] this vast ocean of, of.
Mm-hmm. .
Paul Shapiro: Yeah, it is a pretty vast white space or maybe a blue space out there in the seafood realm. I, I don't know what yield costs are but I presume it's not cheap to eat eel. I mean, they're all like wild caught, right? So I, I presume that these are. Highly priced items, and I've wondered why there isn't more attention here.
Because if you think about the efforts to get down to price parity, people think of price parity as if it's one number, but it's not one number. It's the price of that particular species meat at any given time. And so I was looking at like Dungeness crab recently, and it's like $35 a. $35 a pound. And so imagine if it's technologically comparable to try to grow, let's say beef cells or cow cells or crab cells.
You know, you don't have to get nearly as cheap as beef, which is only a few dollars a pound. To compete on cost with crab. And I think the same is so with a lot of, not with all species [00:25:00] of fish like Pollock I know is very inexpensive, but like salmon, you know, it is more expensive and so you probably have an easier time reaching price parity eventually than somebody trying to grow chicken cells.
Would you agree with that?
Justin Kolbeck: Yeah. Yeah, definitely. And you know, I can give you kind of a, a fun numeric example to, to put a finer point on that. So, you know one of the people who works with us is a former sushi chef. And I was just asking him while we were mentioning on some, some food last week to talk to me about their economics, right?
So they works at, he worked at a very fine dining sushi place here in San Francisco and they would pay about 20 bucks a pound for their sus. They're, they're sushi salmon then they would discard 70% of the fish's weight . Right. So let's say like conservatively, maybe you're getting 50% yield. That means that, Sorry,
Paul Shapiro: when you say discard, you mean like the, the fins in the head or you talking about
Justin Kolbeck: some reason Yeah, yeah.
The fins in the head, but also just the less choice parts of the meat. Right. Because for, for their application, they're actually very specific. So to get down to [00:26:00] that, Saku that I was talking about, that we're making, you actually have to discard a lot more of the fish than you would in some other applications.
But let's just say for, for rounding errors that it's, you know, 50%, that means the actual cost to the restaurant is $40 just for the fish. And let's not forget that you probably paid a highly trained sushi. Something like 20 to $30 an hour, I think at least in San Francisco, an hour or two of labor to break that down.
So where, where you end up with is like on a price per pound basis, even though nominally it looks like it's 20 bucks a pound, in fact it's closer to 60, right? Is, is what sushi restaurants are effectively paying for their seafood. And so, you know, that price, even though it's the same salmon is very different from, let's say, a salmon that's being used.
In ravioli, which could be like a trimming or something like that, or even in locks. So I, I think it's, it is really interesting, even within the same species when you think about sort of the highest and best use, let's say, [00:27:00] for a particular cut of fish.
Paul Shapiro: So that's a really interesting point. Are you, let me ask you both this, I, if it's, let's say 20 to $60 a pound for salmon today, what can wild type produce that today and what do you project that you can produce at tomorrow?
Justin Kolbeck: Yeah, so it's, it's still a bit, we're still a bit higher than that. . So to answer your question, maybe somewhat o obliquely you know, we're higher than that and we're hoping to get closer to that and then not too distant future.
Paul Shapiro: So I, so I should feel fortunate cuz I've even. Your fish at least two times to my memory.
I remember I ate it prior to the pandemic. You all had an event that I was grateful to be a part of where you're serving it as sushi. And then just a few days ago we're recording this in August, 2022. I got to enjoy it in your office as well and it was delicious. But I guess you're saying that you were expending a good expense by, by offering this.
Justin Kolbeck: Yes. It's a, you know, we can't, can't put a price on friendship, I suppose. Yeah. [00:28:00] You
Paul Shapiro: literally buying my friendship. No, its delicious.
Justin Kolbeck: I, But if you could, it'd be pretty expensive. Yeah.
Paul Shapiro: it, it looked phenomenal. And as anybody can look online and we'll include photos on the website, business for good podcast.com so people can see this, including photos that I took when I was eating it.
But I mean, it, it really looks like salmon. And I, I guess I, I would wonder how much of it is fish sell? Like is it a blended item? Is it hybridized with some plant proteins as well, or is it entirely made from animal?
Arye Elfenbein: You know, it's, it's something that's, that's changing constantly. So our cells do require a structure to grow within, to mature within and, and really create the, the complex textures and, and flavors.
And we've worked with a variety of, of different forms. Starting with what is, what is just a hundred percent of cells taste like what is a very low percent of cells taste like? And, and you know what we. Been working towards. And what we've you know, the, the product that you tasted was one where cells are the number one ingredient after water.
I think that that has [00:29:00] been our great guiding principle all along. So we, we don't want this to, to just be an afterthought. We think that and we have data to, to show that that cells when they grow in. Nutritious formulations and in the same kind of environments that they would experience within the animal.
Contribute an enormous amount of positive flavor and complexity that really bridge the gap between what's available today on the plant-based side and conventional seafood. And so, so this is, you know, a, an incredibly transformative ingredient, if you think of it that way, for cells. So, so our guiding principle has been that that sells are the, the, the main ingredient in that sense, and that we are able to achieve The, the same kind of nutritional equivalence when it comes to, So some of the important aspects such as fats and in particular the polyunsaturated fatty acid such as omega threes, omega sixes, and and so forth.
Mm-hmm. . Um, And so, but, but week to week that, that has changed. And even for, for different applications you know, baking [00:30:00] versus. Raw salmon sahimi. That's, that's something that we're constantly adjusting.
Justin Kolbeck: Yeah.
Paul Shapiro: Okay. So speaking of adjusting, you all have gone from this idea that two friends had to now having raised over $120 million in capital, you are running this operation.
How many folks are employed there?
Justin Kolbeck: 59.
Paul Shapiro: So you've gone from this idea to now being the captains of this 59 person ship. The adjustment on your own lives I'm sure is pretty dramatic. You know, this is what like every want to be entrepreneur is fantasizing about raising these vast sums of money and building a great team.
Getting out product. So what has changed in your lives from, let's say, six years ago when you started the company to today? I mean, did you all, do you think you had the experience to be running a 59 person company at that point? Did you pick it up along the way? Like [00:31:00] what has changed in your lives as a result of engaging in this company?
Justin Kolbeck: You know, maybe I'll, I'll start. This is Justin. Couple things. One you know, I, I was fortunate to have had some, some pretty early and transformative leadership opportunities. Actually my pre MBA career as a diplomat my last assignment was on a provincial reconstruction team in a place called pika, Afghanistan, just right on the, the, the border with Pakistan.
And in that role, , I think that year I was 29 years old. I was the, the counterpart to a full bird colonel on the army side. And worked directly with the provincial governor to help connect his government directly to to cobble. I had a hundred million dollar development budget that I was responsible for overseeing.
So, you know, talk about trial by fire, so, you know, I am, I think, fortunate to have had that kind of on the, on the back burner, and then a lot of opportunities as a consultant to work very closely with some CEOs of pretty [00:32:00] big companies and see how they made the decisions they made. But honestly, none of that has been as transformative in the last six years since we started.
Wild Type has Becoming a father, to be honest of two twins who are, who just turned three. I think like in, when I think about how my life has changed over these last six years the impact you know, the sort of growing responsibilities that have come along with, with wild type, pale in comparison to kind of being the, you know, the father of these kids.
And my wife and I both have very active, busy careers. And so I think, you know, it's been A real interesting and, and fun challenge to kind of balance personal and family obligations with, with such a demanding career here. So I think, you know, if, if you ask me like, what is the number one thing that's changed, I'd say it's that you know, and I, I don't.
I definitely haven't figured it all out, but I think at, at least at this point, I, I've kind of keep kept the, the chaos in relative order. And it kinda kept my head above water, but it's, it's definitely a, a challenge to, you know, to kind of be an entrepreneur and a, [00:33:00] you know, and a father of a couple small kids.
Paul Shapiro: Yeah. You remind, Oh, go on a, I'm sorry.
Justin Kolbeck: No, no, no. Please.
Paul Shapiro: It, it reminds me in some ways I was listening to this interview with the the head of Peloton, and he was talking about how at the beginning of the company that he was working such long hours that his wife asked him if they could just set aside one night a week in order for them just to have a dinner together.
And according to him, his response was that he would do that on the condition that they could talk about what they would do when the company went ba. Because they was taking this time off. I was like, Oh man. It's brutal. It, it's, it's really brutal. Yeah, bet. But I hope you get to spend some time with your kids, Justin.
Justin Kolbeck: That would be nice. Well, You know, I can tell you my kids do sit in on a lot of meetings cuz they just like, when I'm on those days, I'm working from home. You know, they'll just kind of barge in while I'm interviewing someone or in the middle of a sensitive HR discussion or something like that. Training at a young, All right.
Paul Shapiro: Were you gonna say something about how your life is changed? I wanna cut you off. [00:34:00]
Arye Elfenbein: Yeah. I mean, you know, OB obviously my, my The kind of stuff I was doing before was, was quite different. I think there, there really was a sense of, you know, as Justin described, the maybe preparation that, that, you know, his prior role had provided for some of the leadership.
That obviously is just critically important now for, for wild type and in my case it was probably how to handle Just a lot of simultaneous crises. I think this would particularly happen you know, in, in the world of critical care in you know, there are times where I'd be covering three hospitals that, you know, four in the morning and have multiple things just go.
Pretty horribly wrong in, in different places and, and how to manage these types of things. And I sometimes look back on those experiences. As a, as a source of guidance for, for how to get through what are the, you know, inevitable ups and downs of of, of startup life. But what I'd say is, what I think has changed more than anything else is, is two they are, [00:35:00] there are two things.
One is that. All of that intensity has only been magnified in the, the context of, of wild type, every aspect of the, the highs and lows and, you know, the celebrating the, the wins and what can feel like pretty crushing losses. All of that is just profoundly magnified now. In a way that it wasn't in, in any of the other you know, like career realms that, that, that I had worked in.
And the second aspect is, you know, when, when I was working in, in the icu, and it's very easy to see, you know, by the end of the shift if. There's progress that has been made. And you can imagine what the, the impact is in, in that in that moment and in those hours of, of what we can do as a medical team and in, in academic research.
I also while I, you know, just found it to be just absolutely fascinating, fascinating work would often wonder about what the When the overall impact of, of these discoveries might you know, [00:36:00] benefit humanity or, or, you know, even other aspects of of, of our planet's health. But in the case of wild type, I think that there is a sense of immediacy where we can, you know, just really, really see how, how this can have such an impact.
So so soon if we, if we do things well, if we have a great product, if we you know, Inspire the trust of our future customers if we are open about the, the ways that we create these products. And, and that's something that's just given, at least for me, a sense of purpose that that, that I've, I've just never had previously.
Paul Shapiro: Yeah, I understand that feeling about the sense of purpose. You're talking about your future customers, and I know that you all have these partnerships. So you've got partnerships with Snow Fox, which has like 1200 sushi bars and Okay Works, which has several dozen as well. What do these partnerships mean?
You're not selling anything yet. You don't have regulatory approval to sell anything yet. If you did have regulatory approval, [00:37:00] could you start selling to them? Like, are you capable of producing enough that you could put something in these sushi bars and, and if not, what do the partnerships actually entail?
Justin Kolbeck: So when we, when we started the company a while ago actually probably the very first year we made a decision that we weren't going to have an in-house chef who was gonna divide, just sort of direct, let's say re r and d. And part of the reason we wanted to do that is cuz we wanted a. A wide range of voices telling us, you know, A, what products should we make and why?
And B, reacting to our prototypes. Cause we, we thought the, the more significant, honest and unbiased the feedback from as many voices as possible, the faster we would be able to develop products that looked and tasted. Great. Some things we can do in house and, you know, we don't have to sort of go out to get opinions on.
So for example, we know how far we are from nutritional equivalents and we can measure that really accurately and not worry about it. We can also pretty much measure color and, and so on. The things that [00:38:00] are. Qualitative are really hard to do. Right? And even if we have a really highly trained internal sensory panel we're still to a large extent, gonna be living in an echo chamber.
So the idea with these partnerships was, you know, a to get to know our future customers, what do they care about? Why did they come to us? What would motivate them to buy more? I know how much how how much further do we have to get our cost down for this to be interesting to, for them to be able to carry it, for example.
But also just to give them really regular access to our products and hear what they've. Think about it. Right. And this started back in, I think our first real taste test was in 2018. Our like very early prototypes from the year before. We kind of just ate ourselves and some close friends and family.
But you know, we really started giving it to chefs in 2018. And those first few bees of comments that we got from chefs were really, Not good. You know, the product. Brutal. Yeah. Pro the product, you know, had some real limitations back then. And what
Paul Shapiro: was it [00:39:00] flavor? Was it texture? Was it color? Was it scent?
Like what, what were the main complaints or, or all of the above. Yes,
Justin Kolbeck: All right. There's, there was a lot to do and you know, but the thing is, we were so proud of it, right? Because we had spent months cultivating the cells that we needed for those products. And, and, you know, and rightly so, nobody had ever done this before, at least that had sort of written about it publicly.
And so and that was certainly true, you know, back in 2017 too, in the early days with our very first prototypes. But, you know, the, the idea with, with these partnerships was to really give the, the culinary community of voice. Into what a company looks, a company like ours is doing, right? Like, why should 59 people have the sole voice over what products we develop?
It seemed a lot better to, to open up that that conversation more broadly. And so, you know, I think that started a, you know, a really. Healthy progression toward, you know, really great relationships. And today, even though we've only announced a couple of these partners, you know, we have [00:40:00] dozens of people with very big, successful restaurant chains who are regularly tasting with us and giving us input.
Paul Shapiro: Well, that's cool. That's that's nice feedback to be able to get, which of course then leads to the question that everybody always has, which, you know, you're going to get asked on a regular basis about when it'll actually be on a menu somewhere. And so I remember, so when I was writing the book, Queen Meet Jason Mathy, who was the founder of New Harvest and Interest.
Interestingly enough, he was disappointed. The CEO of the Rand Corporation, by the way. But anyway, he, he made a joke to me and you know, he founded New Harvest, I think it was around 2005, and he made a joke to me around like 2016 or 2017, that whenever anybody asks him when cultivated meat would be on the market, it was always five years away, no matter what year he has asked, He would always just tell them five years away, you all have now been running this company for.
Six years, you've raised 120 million. When do [00:41:00] you think that you'll actually start selling product and making the difference that you're seeking to?
Justin Kolbeck: Five years. Yeah, about five years. Yeah. Got it. Okay.
Paul Shapiro: Sounds good. Sounds great. Why, why even update the book ?
Arye Elfenbein: I think there, there are a couple of aspects of that obviously.
The one of which is our ability to, to produce and certainly will, you know, be very supply constrained in the, in the early days. And you know, us scaling up. Something that we obviously do have some degree of control over. But the other aspect that we have less control over is the regulatory component.
And so we've, we've been talking to FDA for almost three years now. And one thing I'd. You know, if I were to characterize the, the, the dialogue in, you know, just briefly I'd say that it's, it's been very thoughtful and it's been one where the learning has been. Really profound on both sides. And, and it's actually been far better than I had expected.
Maybe I had low expectations, but but, but it's something that, that [00:42:00] has been very methodical very scientific. And, and so I think that this is something that we shouldn't be rushing as, as a process. I think that it's, it's an important one when it comes to as we mentioned earlier, that the trust of our future customers.
But also in, in just the, the nature of assessing this new type of food. So that's something that the, you know, the, the timeline of which FDA has, has not been very clear and has, has never really given us a date when, when that will occur. Mm-hmm. , it feels like we're, you know, closer, but, but we don't actually know
Justin Kolbeck: what, what that feeling is.
Paul Shapiro: If, if they came to you today and and said, Hey, we're giving you the green light, you can start selling, how long would it be before you could be on a restaurant menu? Versus a chain of restaurant menus, let's say.
Justin Kolbeck: Yeah, that's, that's the sort of, I think, finer point that, you know, I wanted to add to Aria's comment which is, you know, the, the answer to your question, Paul, is very soon, like within, you know, a matter of months not [00:43:00] less.
But that's, that's really the thing, right? Is that, you know, I think when you, if you ask someone, when is a product launch, when it comes to food, it's. You know, in a handful of restaurants that only a few select people who happen to live there can have access and maybe even on certain nights, right?
Like what it was like in the early days of the Impossible Burger when they were just at a handful of restaurants. I think most people, when they think about adoption, they think about when is it hitting the grocery stores and when can it go into any Kroger store and find wild type salmon, Right? And, and I think that's, you know, in all transparency, still a ways off.
And it's for the first reason that already mentioned, which is, you know, The, the challenges associated with scaling up something so new you know, we've made really tremendous progress that we're super proud of on that, on that front, but there's still a, a long way to go. And so I think if you ask, you know, just about anybody at, at least while they're sober they will tell, they will tell you that it's gonna be, you know, a minute before we're, we're sort of at that, that very large skill.
Mm-hmm. Period for, for [00:44:00] this industry. And I, and I, and I think hopefully that doesn't come as a surprise to too many people,
Paul Shapiro: right? I mean, even in Singapore where Eat just has their good meat chicken on sale, it's still basically a very select group of people. It's, and it's only for sale once a week in this restaurant.
It's not exactly like you're gonna go to a supermarket there and find it. And so it. It raises the question of what, when you're talking to investors, obviously many of them believe strongly in what you're doing, and you've got a lot of really well seasoned and smart investors on your cap table now, and so they must obviously be pretty patient.
because in order to generate like the type of real revenue, like tens or hundreds of millions of dollars that they would like to see that that's still a good number of years away. So what is it do you think that attracts them to a company like yours that knows that it's still gonna be many years before you start attracting the type of revenue that would typically interest those type of big ticket investors?
Justin Kolbeck: Yeah, look, a couple [00:45:00] things. One you know, the seafood industry globally is roughly trillion dollars, right? So you mentioned today, you know, plant based meat is 1% of that market. 1% of a trillion dollars is a really big company, right? And even. Even if it was shared among a few companies, very successful companies.
So I think just the size of the prize and the, the relative posity of companies that are in seafood make it really interesting to investors, right, who are looking primarily for financial return. The other side of it is that I think a lot of them particularly, you know, just use Al Catterton for example, who led our last round.
They spent a lot of time talking to Consumer businesses and restaurants. And I'll, you know, I'll give you an example without kind of naming who it was. I had a conversation yesterday with the general manager of a, of a seafood brand, and they have a few criteria that they use for sourcing seafood.
They're very thoughtful, I think, stewards of the environment and, you know, just to name a couple of these hurdles. One of them was not relying on. Wild catch inputs [00:46:00] for the production of fish, which rules out a heck of a lot of farmed fish, unfortunately, which still relies on things like anchovies and sardines as a big part of, of their feed.
Another one of their criteria was Minimized impact to the environment or pollution. And that's also hard to do with a lot of the current forms of, of, of production. And so what's happening is I think people at the restaurant level are hearing their customers asking increasingly for real sustainable seafood options.
But once you scratch beneath the surface a little bit, it gets. It gets hard to find that they are certainly there unquestionably. But the challenge is a lot of those really sustainable seafood options are tiny, minuscule scale. And, and so I, I think it's the confluence of a really big market opportunity with a clear shift in consumer demand for some of these things.
You know, and, and this, these folks came to us, right? You know, we. At least one or two inbound emails or calls a week with people kind of asking to learn more [00:47:00] about our product. So I think it's really those two kind of simultaneous trends that have created a lot of interest even though this isn't a get rich quick kind of investment.
Paul Shapiro: Right. It's definitely not get rich quick, but I, I do think that the opportunity is extraordinarily vast and considering the rate at which we are plundering the oceans, it may be that if people are gonna want to eat fish in the future, that this is what they're going to be eating. And so those who are early pioneers in it might, might have that, that great leg up.
And of course, the funding that you all have raised helps you to get way out ahead in, in terms of this race to be commercially ready when the regulators do give that green light. So let me ask you guys, like you have been in for this like real whale of a tail here with. Wild type. I mean, it's like incredible to think that when Aria, you and I were sitting next to each other at that conference in San Francisco in 2016, that six [00:48:00] years later you would be the captain of this ship with 60 people on there along with Justin.
You know, it, it's like a, it's really, it's like almost like a dream come true. So I would imagine that there are resources that you've relied. In terms of your own education regarding being ex an executive at a company and so on, that have been helpful. And so let me ask you, for people who are looking at the success that you all are having, is there anything you'd recommend for them?
Anything that you think that they should check out? Maybe a book or a movie or a speech or anything that's been useful for you in your journey as an entrepreneur here?
Justin Kolbeck: I think more than a movie
Arye Elfenbein: or book or a tangible resource, it's , maybe a d a degree of attention to the people in our lives that you, who, if you look at them, you kind of wanna be like them in some way. I think I've, I've been lucky to, to have quite a few of these people who I've, who I've met, and some are great at some things and, and not as great at others.
And I think just keeping it in my mind [00:49:00] when people have done really well at something or when I've been just really impressed or grateful or have you. Felt recognized for for something that I had done in, in, in the past the way in which that was done. All of these I think have have guided me now.
And, and I think that these are the types of things that the more you collect, the more you sort of look around and, and see these examples of people doing great work in, in different ways. I think that. You know, for me at least, is, has been a far richer resource than, than any one particular book or course, or, or anything like that.
Paul Shapiro: Got it. How about you, Justin?
Justin Kolbeck: Y you know, I, I agree with Aria. I think you know this. Network of mentors that have come forward and have offered to help us. I, I think both of us approach our jobs with a great deal of humility, right? Neither of us have been a founder before. Certainly neith of us, neither of us have led a cell cultivated seafood company to success, right?
So there's a heck of a lot we can learn about [00:50:00] literally everything. From the science to the people, to the finance, to the fundraising, you name it. And, and, you know, have made ourselves true students of our craft at the generosity of other people who have kind of, are, are a little bit more experienced than us, who have made themselves available to coach us.
And you know, I, you, you asked this question about people who are listening, you know, I'd say one thing, you know that. Exists for real is this sort of pri decor among entrepreneurs. You know, I, I see you out there. Anybody who's starting a company, I feel what you're going for going through you know, including you, Paul, and, you know, it's, it's hard.
It's really hard. But I think that sort of creates this space where we look out for each other and we are happy to kind of share our knowledge. , maybe when we're on the other side of that kind of journey toward a quote unquote successful enterprise. And, and so I, I, I think it's really been that sort of network.
That's been the biggest thing for me.
Paul Shapiro: Yeah. You know, it's funny you mentioned that because when my co-founder Joanna Bromley and I started the Better Meet Co we were trying to figure out like the most basic things, like how do you [00:51:00] run payroll? Like all these things. And we contacted you guys and you were like, Actually, here's the service that we use for this and here's the service that we use for this.
And we tried this corporate credit card and it was really useful and I appreciated that. And four years later Joanna and I are, are still running this company when we get younger. Companies contacting us. I always think, you know, I would like to pay it forward and do for them what Justin did for us back in 2018 when the better Miko was started.
And so I appreciate that and and rest assured that it has not forgotten.
Justin Kolbeck: Ah, thank you. I appreciate that. And you know, somebody did that for us too. We actually went down to Union Bank here in San Francisco and tried to open a bank account and they're like, Where's your revenue? Come back . That's the thing.
We're a. Yeah. Silicon Valley Bank, that was a great story. Yeah. So, so yeah. I mean there's, there's this really incredible network and, and on honestly, the only price of admission is just taking a swing and getting your company going.
Paul Shapiro: Yeah, yeah, for sure. Yeah. It's cliche of [00:52:00] course, but I do think that the line that you miss every shot you don't take is certainly pertinent here.
So speaking of missing shots that people. Aren't yet taking, Obviously you guys have had a lot of ideas from the SCH nozzle to wild type, but what else would you recommend if somebody's sitting here listening to you thinking, Hey, I wanna do something really cool for the world, but I'm not sure what I wanna do.
Do you have any thoughts on things that you hope somebody else will start?
Justin Kolbeck: Yes. . Okay. . I do. So I really love chocolate milk and there maybe it still exists, but there was this like Belgian dark chocolate milk brand called Coco Metro, which was creamy and so chocolatey and just. Really freaking good. I'm not sure if it exists anymore.
I, I can't find it on the, on the shelves, but if someone can make that product and ideally make it in a way that's sort of climate friendly let's talk because I will be your number one brand ambassador. But yes climate friendly chocolate milk please.
Paul Shapiro: You know, I actually had the board Cow Chocolate Milk recently.
This is a, a new brand that started with [00:53:00] Perfect Days whe Protein. Ooh. And, and I, I liked it. I I thought it was very good. So you can check 'em out at the, the brand is called Board Cow, b o r e d, as in the cow has been retired, and so it was now bored. But yeah, I, I don't know if it's like the special Belgian chocolate type thing that you're talking about, but it was good chocolate milk.
I liked it. All right. Thank you. Yeah. Any other idea?
Justin Kolbeck: I think the sch nozzle and chocolate milk .
Paul Shapiro: Okay. . You'll, if, if somebody tells you a funny enough joke, you might actually emit the chocolate milk through your nose and then need the nozzle in order to clean it out. So on that note, Justin, Ariel, thank.
Yeah, . All right. Well, congratulations on all your success. As you know, I'm rooting hard for you. I really enjoyed your fish the times that I have eaten it, and I hope to be able to purchase it at a sushi bar sometime in the near future. So tell the FDA to get on it and we will go out there and create a sea change in the way that humanity eat seafood.
Justin Kolbeck: Thanks Paul.
Arye Elfenbein: Thanks so much, Paul.
[00:54:00]