• Cultivated meat is edging closer to becoming a commercial reality, but there are challenges still making it hard to manufacture at scale and reduce price. 
• Basal media is a vital component in cultivated meat production, but traditional options are expensive, aren’t food-grade and don’t come with much data.
• In 2025, Multus will be releasing a new basal media product, optimised to address the cultivated meat industry’s challenges.

‍Why Basal Media Needs Work…

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‍Basal media is the main input to cultivated meat production, providing the nutrients needed for cell growth and viability - so it’s essential to get it right. However, current offerings fail to meet cell biologists’ needs.

Early-stage cultivated meat projects need basal media that isn’t restricted to research use, allowing it to support their journey from small-scale lab work in R&D to full commercial-scale production as they grow. These solutions are needed today, but the current supply chain isn’t ready, leaving cellular agriculture companies without media that can support their entire journey from R&D to commercialisation. Multus aims to address this gap in 2025, with a new food-grade basal media product that will allow cultivated meat start-ups to innovate and scale.

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‍The Three Biggest Challenges in Basal Media and How We’re Fixing Them

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‍1 - The Lack of Food Grade Options

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‍Most basal media formulations available today are sourced from the life science supply chain. When used for cultivated meat R&D, these basal media products would create an end product that fails to meet regulatory standards such as the EU’s Novel Food Regulation. This is because basal media is traditionally created with pharmaceutical-grade components rather than food materials. Plus, many of the options available are restricted to ‘research-only’ use, making them unsuitable for commercial applications.

In addition, the small-scale nature of the life sciences supply chain makes it difficult to use its basal media for large-scale production. Both regulatory approval and scalability are crucial components of cultivated meat production.

Using our advanced screening capacity, powered by lab automation and machine learning, we’re working with raw material suppliers in the food and agricultural supply chain to test ingredients and formulations. This will enable us to create food-grade basal media for the cellular agriculture industry, filling the gap left by traditional suppliers.

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‍2 - It’s Too Expensive

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‍Traditional basal media is not available in affordable, lab-scale quantities. High-cost products aren’t the end of the world for small-scale research, but on a commercial scale, a low cost per unit is critical. 

Despite this, early-stage cultivated meat companies often overpay for products designed for life sciences rather than food production - because they have no viable alternatives. At this stage, these companies cannot afford to lose valuable time formulating their own media, as their focus must remain on advancing R&D to develop their core products. With a dip in venture capital funding for cultivated meat companies in recent years, the pressure to deliver tangible results has only increased. Without access to affordable, food-grade options, they are forced to rely on costly life science solutions to keep projects moving forward.

Despite the hard work put into them, products developed with this media fail to meet regulatory standards for consumer approval. This forces companies to reformulate during scale-up, creating unnecessary setbacks and expenses. As a result, cultivated meat companies are forced to waste money on media that ultimately cannot be used for commercial cultivated meat growth.

By doing the heavy lifting on R&D, we’ll soon be able to provide affordable, liquid food-grade basal media in small and large quantities suited for lab-scale R&D. This will allow companies to focus on innovation while we ensure their media is ready for regulatory approval and scalable production.

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‍3 - There’s Limited Data and Transparency

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‍Traditionally, basal media suppliers don’t pass on much information about performance and ingredient sourcing, leaving cultivated meat companies guessing which formulas will work best for their needs. The need to rely on trial-and-error testing increases costs and can be a waste of time and resources.

We’re working to solve this problem by leveraging our large-scale testing capabilities to evaluate ingredients and performance comprehensively before passing this information on to our customers. We’re looking at factors like cell performance and cell health to ensure our media is high-performance. This will also allow us to pair our basal media with our animal component-free serum, offering a complete solution for cultivated meat R&D. By stacking Multus’ affordable food-grade products, cultivated meat companies can be confident in the performance of their media and serum, ensuring they have the best tools to accelerate their innovation.

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‍Our Basal Media Product

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‍Multus’ food-grade basal media product will address the key challenges facing cultivated meat companies today. It will ensure compliance with the food-grade standards needed for regulatory approval, providing a cost-effective solution ready for lab-scale R&D. Plus, it will offer fully transparent performance data, enabling cellular agriculture companies to innovate with confidence and efficiency.

Launching later this year, our basal media will allow cultivated meat companies to innovate faster, scale smarter, and bring sustainable products to market with confidence.

At Multus, our mission is to reduce the time and cost of bringing biomanufactured foods and materials to market. We’re accelerating the development process to make media that performs better and costs less, helping our partners deliver impact at scale.

To stay updated on our journey, follow our LinkedIn page.