World’s First Lab Cell Grown Cotton Seals $50mn Deal
Boston and USA based start-up Galy has signed a deal with Japanese manufacturer Suzuran Medical Inc. to use the startup’s cotton, which has been grown through laboratory cells, instead of plants in its products.
This will be the first time that laboratory grown cotton will enter any market globally.
Suzuran, which is one of the largest manufacturers of surgical cotton in the world, says it plans to use thousands of tons per annum of Galy’s cotton as part of a ten year and $50 million deal.
“Suzuran will use Galy’s cotton grown from cells in products like cosmetic cotton and cotton sheets, and medical products such as gauze and absorbent cotton for medical and consumer use,” Forbes reported.
To make the Galy cotton, a team collects samples from a plant and harvests its cells. The cells are grown in bioreactor or fermentation vessels in a cell culture process similar to beer brewing.
“The final product is dried and harvested, with minimised water, land and energy use,” the company said which was founded in 2019 as a cellular agriculture startup.
Galy recently won the annual ‘Global Change Award’ from the Sweden-based H&M Foundation and bagged the first prize of Euros 300,000 with the award, which is also referred to as the Nobel Prize of fashion.
