Meet Mari-Ann Fonseca & Mart-Erik Martens, Founders of Gelatex
Invest in startups like Gelatex alongside Climate Capital here.
Founders: Mari-Ann Meigo Fonseca & Märt-Erik Martens
Motto: Our mission is to make the world a more sustainable and healthy place to live. We help to achieve that by enabling industrial tissue engineering for applications such as cultured meat, wound care or animal-free drug testing with our unique over 90% more cost-effective nanofibrous scaffolds and microcarriers.
Year Founded: 2016
Stage: Series A
Location: Tallinn, Estonia
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Climate Capital: What made you want to solve this problem?
Mari-Ann: Gelatex enables industrial tissue engineering and cell culture to become a reality by providing 90% more cost-effective nanofibrous scaffolds and microcarriers for cultured meat, wound care and pharmaceutical companies. Our uniqueness relies on proprietary nanofiber production technology called halospinning. This technology enables cost-effective high-speed production of materials that have unique 3D porous structure enhancing cell proliferation and differentiation. Our materials enable to create also the right texture for the meat so that it would have the same organoleptic characteristics as we are used to with meat.
The company was founded in 2016 by two founders who met in the university – materials scientist and engineer Märt-Erik Martens and Mari-Ann Meigo Fonseca whose background was in textile industry, manufacturing and business consulting. However, the business idea back then was completely different, although still connected to sustainability and creating positive impact. The initial aim was to make leatherlike textile using nanofibers of gelatin in order to use the abundant waste of meat industries and kind of make ""5 hides from the same cow"", while also providing a material chemically identical to leather that comes in rolls and is easier to use in mass-production. Because of our own need we invented halospinning technology because we needed to scale up nanofibers production. Already in 2019 our nanofibrous materials were used by one of the professors in the university for liver cancer drug research and compared with alternative solutions which made us realize that halospinning is able to produce materials that are ideal for industrial tissue engineering. It can provide both materials with the right structure that the cells love but also bring down the costs to necessary level. These features are especially necessary in cultured meat applications, where the scale is extremely important to reach. We really fell in love with the idea of cultured meat as it is much more environmentally friendly and sustainable way for producing meat, much more ethical and there is no waste created at all. In 2020, we decided to pivot to develop nanofibrous scaffolds and microcarriers for tissue engineering and cell culture applications, cultured meat getting majority of our focus now.
Climate Capital: What are you building?
Mari-Ann: Gelatex makes scaffolds and microcarriers for industrial tissue engineering applications such as cultured meat. Our materials enable to give the right texture and mouthfeel for cultured meat and bring down the cost of the meat.
Climate Capital: What is next?
Mari-Ann: Right now we have over 30 product variants in our portfolio, we are testing with over 60 companies in the field, several meat prototypes have been made and passed Michelin star chef tastings. The next step for us is to standardize the products, receive regulatory approval and set up pilot production according to quality standards in order to prepare for commercial production. Currently we are preparing to close our fundraising round and hope to start with these activities soon.
Climate Capital: What are the core elements of the culture you are building at your company?
Mari-Ann: Gelatex has a very passionate determined team. We believe that small things have a big impact (just like nanofibers), collaboration is the key to take us further and it is important to experiment, be curious and just START. I believe we very much live this culture in every element of the business, being that we truly value each team member or are very proactive and get stuff done fast.
Climate Capital: What are the key challenges as you scale your company?
Mari-Ann: As a first-time entrepreneur, I did not have also much team-leading experience before and for somebody who loves to get stuff done quickly and not just chit-chat about stuff, it was somewhat challenging for me when the team grew to first accept that with the larger team, much more needs to be discussed and it can become really time-consuming. We are still in the process of overcoming these challenges by implementing various tools for making the internal processes and communication more efficient and also creating more structured meetings, etc, and I have really started to enjoy that process now.
Climate Capital: What have you learned that you want to share with other founders?
Mari-Ann: As a founder who pivoted from making leatherlike textiles for fashion to making a kind of "textile" for cultured meat production while still using the same core technology, I think the many learning is not to be afraid of saying out loud and accepting if you feel things are not right. A much better opportunity might be just right behind the corner if you give yourself time to look around. Pivots are awesome.
Climate Capital: How can the broader climate community help you on your mission?
Mari-Ann: Many people still do not know about cultured meat and/or what role nanofibers play in it. I would be happy to talk at events, webinars, podcasts, or for different articles to explain that more and share our story.
