Plantible

Plantible Foods Inc. is a business-to-business food technology and biology company that cultivates lemna (also called duckweed or water lentils) and extracts RuBisCO protein from it, marketed as Rubi Protein. The company describes itself as operating a vertically integrated agricultural platform: it grows lemna in controlled, automated enclosed commercial greenhouses, then uses a proprietary water-based process to separate functional proteins and whole-plant ingredients. Alongside Rubi Protein, the company produces nutrient-rich whole plant ingredients marketed as Lemna Leaf Greens.

Rubi Protein is positioned as a complete protein containing all essential amino acids, with a PDCAAS score of 1.0 (equivalent to animal protein), a neutral taste, odor and color, and no known allergens. It can be declared on labels as "lemna leaf protein" and holds a "no questions" letter from the FDA affirming GRAS status in the US. Functional applications cited include emulsification, gelation and binding, with use in baked goods, confectionery, breadings and coatings, dairy and plant-based dairy, sauces and dressings, gluten-free pasta, plant-based meat, and sports/adult nutrition. Management states that customer interest is driven less by plant-based positioning than by functionality, including as a clean-label binder and alternative to methylcellulose and to volatile egg and dairy/whey proteins.

The company's cultivation model is presented as land-efficient and resilient: lemna is described as doubling in mass every 48 hours for year-round daily harvest, yielding ten times more protein per acre than soy while using ten times less water and no arable land. Capacity is designed to grow through modular replication of existing greenhouse units rather than added process complexity.

Founding story

Company materials state that in 2018 two Dutch entrepreneurs, Tony Martens and Maurits van de Ven, set out to rethink the foundations of the food industry by working backwards from the question of what an ideal protein would look like and where it exists in nature. That search led them to RuBisCO, the most abundant protein on Earth, which had never been commercialized at scale because existing supply chains were not built to unlock it, and then to lemna as a fast-growing source of fresh biomass capable of preserving proteins and nutrients through processing. Founding dates reported for the company differ: press coverage and the company's own story page cite 2018, while a 2026 interview with Martens states he cofounded Plantible in 2016 with van de Ven. Early operations were based at a two-acre duckweed farm in San Diego, where the co-founders lived in two trailers on site after California's statewide COVID-19 lockdown was announced.

Business model

Business-to-business supply of food ingredients to food manufacturers. Plantible is vertically integrated, cultivating its own lemna crop and processing it into protein and whole-plant ingredients, and reports securing long-term offtake agreements with customers. Management describes the basic unit economics as already profitable, with overall company profitability dependent on unlocking additional production capacity.

Sale of ingredient volumes (Rubi Protein and Lemna Leaf Greens) to food manufacturers, underpinned by long-term offtake agreements and a customer order pipeline; one customer is reported to have doubled its 2027 order.

Traction

Production capacity scaled 150x via a pilot plant in the year before the 2021 Series A; team grew from five to 16 at that time. By 2026 the company operated a commercial facility in Eldorado, Texas, with plans to raise annual Rubi Protein capacity five-fold to over 1,000 metric tons, an existing customer pipeline and long-term offtake agreements, a reported 40%+ yield improvement from a new lemna strain, and profitable unit economics at the product level. Plantible is described as one of Schleicher County's fastest-growing employers.

Latest developments

In August 2026 the company announced $35 million in combined debt and equity funding: a $25 million loan from X-Caliber Rural Capital under the USDA Business & Industry / OneRD Loan Guarantee Program and $10 million in equity from RA Capital, Piva Capital and existing investors. Proceeds are to quintuple annual Rubi Protein capacity to more than 1,000 metric tons at Eldorado, Texas, fulfill the existing customer pipeline and enter new markets, with greenhouse construction slated to finish in early 2027. The CEO outlined three possible investor exit routes — acquisition by a strategic ingredients company, an IPO, or a private equity transaction — and expects M&A in the ingredients sector to accelerate over the next three to five years.