The value of Eat Beyond Global Holdings’ recent investment in The Very Good Food Company (VGF), has ballooned more than 800 percent following VGF’s stock market launch. Eat Beyond is the first fund in Canada focused on investing in global companies that are developing and commercializing innovative food products including alternatives to meat, seafood, eggs and dairy.

“[VGF] takes a unique approach to the classic plant-based meat product. Their flagship brand, The Very Good Butcher, features burgers, sausages, pepperoni, ribs, steak and several other popular products you might usually find at the butcher shop, but they butcher beans, not animals. It is a vegan butcher shop that makes plant-based eating approachable, nutritious and delicious,” Patrick Morris, CEO of Eat Beyond Global, tells FoodIngredientsFirst.

While Eat Beyond Global’s primary scope of interest encompasses the plant-based sector, it also expresses an interest in other alternatives to farmed meat. “While plant-based alternatives are getting a lot of attention recently, cellular architecture is advancing rapidly. This means developing animal protein without the animal,” notes Morris.

Eat Beyond’s investment in VGF was at a price of US$0.25 per Common Share. VGF completed its initial public offering including the full exercise of the over-allotment option by the agent for the offering, Canaccord Genuity. This resulted in the issuance of 16,100,000 common shares of the company at a price of US$0.25 per common share for gross proceeds of US$4,025,000.

The common shares were listed on the Canadian Securities Exchange on June 16, 2020 and commenced trading at market open on June 18, 2020. By June 22, the shares closed at a high of US$2.00 per common share.

“We are thrilled to see The Very Good Food Company, another major plant-based IPO, mirroring the success of Beyond Meat. There is clearly extraordinary confidence in this market, and enormous demand for plant-based products,” adds Patrick Morris, CEO of Eat Beyond. “We are excited to continue investing in this growing sector and continuing to be a part of more success stories like this one.”

Eat Beyond continues to actively research and meet with companies working on new groundbreaking opportunities in alternative food space. “We are looking at companies all over the world who are innovating in this area. This includes everything from The Very Good Butcher’s bean burgers to cell agriculture. The interest in these products just continues to increase thanks to the ever-growing list of attractive health, environmental, and food security benefits that plant-based alternatives can offer,” says Morris.

Appetite for meat reduction offerings is underscored amid the coronavirus pandemic. “COVID-19 has highlighted a major issue in many food supply chains. The novel coronavirus is a zoonotic disease, as are bird flu and influenza which originated from domestic chickens and horses and pigs, respectively. Chicken pox, swine flu and tuberculosis all are also zoonotic diseases. The answer is really to reduce our dependence on animal products to help break this cycle,” flags Morris.

“We expect to see this industry continue to grow far beyond plant-based burgers and ultimately change the way that many of us eat in the future. Eliminating factory farming and other harmful practices will go a long way to support both our health and the planet’s,” he concludes.