Investing in an Animal-Free Food System: Milk & Honey Ventures

Around the time his son was born in 2011, Beni Nofech saw a video that changed his life. After listening to an argument about the need to move away from the view that animals are mere commodities for humanity to use however we like, Beni adopted a vegan diet and soon found himself attending animal movement and alt-protein conferences. From there, he began making angel investments in food tech startups that could help animals, eventually leading him to leave his career in the medical device world to become a full-time venture capitalist in the alt-protein food tech world. Today, Beni runs Milk & Honey Ventures, an eight-figure investment fund with a mandate to place early-stage bets on Israeli food tech startups that are seeking to displace animals in the food system. He’s backed some of the biggest names in alt-protein, including many companies who’ve been on this podcast before. In this episode, Beni and I discuss the state of alt-protein investing, whether he views the current apparent malaise as permanent or transitory, and what he sees for the future of this important industry.  I’ve known Beni since 2016 and can attest that he’s a great guy with important insights from which anyone who cares about building a better food system will benefit. Discussed in this episode Beni was influenced to become vegan after seeing this speech online. Beni helped promote this 2016 fundraising video by SuperMeat, to which Paul donated. Beni served on the board of the Modern Agriculture Foundation. Beni recommends: Startup Nation, Clean Meat, Sapiens, and Calvin and Hobbes. Bonus: One of Paul’s favorite Calvin and Hobbes strips.  The Good Food Institute’s suggestions for white space in the alt-protein sector. Our past episodes with Oshi and PoLoPo. Pitch Milk and Honey Ventures at hello@mnhventures.com More about Beni Nofech Beni is the Founding Managing-Partner of Milk & Honey Ventures - Israel’s leading venture capital fund exclusively dedicated to the Sustainable-Protein industry. He has been a key player in the sector in Israel for over a decade, actively serving as an angel investor, entrepreneur, and advocate for the industry. His experience spans investments in over a dozen startups, including some of the most notable success stories in the global alternative-protein space today. Beni’s passion is the effective acceleration of disruptive Sustainable-Protein technologies