NEW YORK — As part of the Unreasonable Food collaboration between Mars Inc. and Unreasonable Group, the pair announced the next cohort of growth stage ventures.
Unreasonable Food was created in 2024 to support entrepreneurs turning the most pressing food chain challenges into business opportunities.
“Addressing the challenges in our food system is a task bigger than any one organization,” said Amanda Davies, chief R&D, procurement and sustainability officer for Mars Snacking. “That’s why it’s so important to build a collaborative ecosystem — connecting brilliant minds behind pioneering ventures with scaled industry leaders — so we can help unlock new possibilities and accelerate the transformation toward a more resilient future.”
Mars has selected 14 purpose-led ventures that represent the next frontier of sustainability advancements. The 2025 Unreasonable Food cohort will prioritize reducing dairy cattle emissions, scaling sustainable ingredients and exploring solutions with partners around sustainable colors. The collaborative will continue working toward the next phase of developing a more sustainable food system that provides consumers with nutritious food options.
Alpine Bio: Engineering crops like soybeans to produce dairy proteins, enabling familiar melt, stretch and creaminess without cows.
Standing Ovation: Producing animal-free casein via precision fermentation to deliver authentic dairy textures for cheese and other foods.
Oobli: Harnessing sweet proteins from plants to create sugar-like taste with no sugar, made scalable through fermentation.
Debut Biotechnology: Fermenting high-value ingredients, including natural color alternatives, to replace unsustainable or synthetic sources.
Octarine Bio: Producing a vibrant palette of natural colors through fermentation, offering reliable, sustainable options for food and textiles.
DE3PBIO: Using AI and biotech to unlock plant-based functional ingredients that make foods cleaner, healthier and more nutritious.
NuCicer: Breeding new chickpea varieties with up to 75% more protein, improving taste, texture and resilience to climate stress.
Plantible Foods: Extracting Rubi protein from lemna (duckweed), a highly sustainable plant that can replace eggs, dairy and additives.
Hydrosome Labs: Leveraging ultrafine bubbles to boost fermentation yields and nutrient delivery, making biomanufacturing more efficient.
Pow.bio: Pioneering continuous fermentation technology that reduces costs and increases capacity for bio-based production.
“We’re honored to welcome these entrepreneurs to the Unreasonable Food family,” said Daniel Epstein, CEO of Unreasonable Group. “Their work reflects our shared ambition to evolve the food system in ways that are sustainable and inclusive. In collaboration with Mars, we stand ready to offer mentorship, convene stakeholders, and surface opportunities that can accelerate their journeys.”
The 2024 inaugural cohort reported an additional nearly $200 million in revenue, 140,000 tons of carbon dioxide equivalent avoided, 310 million liters of water conserved and 1.14 million kilograms of food sold. Additionally, it provided 24 million people with nutritious food and educated 2 million on climate change mitigation and adaptation, while growing job opportunities and improving working conditions across their communities.
The collective 2024 and 2025 venture classes will engage with Mars teams across the enterprise, mentors from Unreasonable Foods and a global investor network to further support their work.
