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Modern Meadow Collects $40M for Real Leather With ‘No Cow Involved’

Xconomy New York — 

Modern Meadow, a New York-based company that has developed a method of turning living cells into materials used to make leather that mimics animal hide, has received a $40 million Series B funding to begin manufacturing and commercializing its leather products.

The company has developed a line of cells that produce collagen, a protein that gives structure to animal tissue and is used to form the company’s leather, according to CEO and co-founder Andras Forgacs. Forgacs declined to specify the kind of cell the company uses, noting that the type of leather Modern Meadow produces—one that is similar to, say, cow hide—is not dependent on the type of cell.

“It does not need to be a mammalian cell or a cow cell to make cow collagen,” he says. The company is targeting what Forgacs says is a $100 billion leather products industry, saying it has an innovative solution that could address global resource challenges by reducing the materials and processes that conventional leather products require.

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