Asia's Richest Man Is Betting Big On Silicon Valley's Fake Eggs

Daniel_Stuckey writes with more news about science making non-human animals obsolete "Li Ka-shing, widely billed as Asia's richest man, announced a $23 million Series B investment in Hampton Creek Foods through his fund Horizon Ventures on Monday, bringing the food technology startup's total take to $30 million after initial investments by people including Vinod Khosla, co-founder of Sun Microsystems. Bill Gates is also an investor and fan. The egg replacement still requires fine-tuning, according to Hampton Creek CEO Josh Tetrick, but the company's mayonnaise replacement is already on shelves at stores including Whole Foods and some of the largest retail brands in the country. (Mayo is usually made with eggs and vinegar.)"

Comments

Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Eggs are dirt cheap and plentiful.

Re: Why?

[drinkypoo]

Because Vegans like breakfast too?

I always presumed they ate breakfast on Vega, now I know.

We're talking about vegans here, though, and if they enjoy their breakfasts so much, why do they need fake eggs? What's wrong with their normal vegan breakfast that they have to eat fake animal protein?

Re: Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Think of all the different foods that use eggs as an ingrediant, it opens the door to more food types for vegans.

Being vegan is a choice. If they don't want to eat eggs then don't eat eggs. But why expend the mental effort to create something fake when the real thing is plentiful, healthy (in moderation), and have been eaten for all of Human history? There are real problems in this world to solve and this seems like an utter waste of effort. Chickens produce eggs and when they aren't good at producing eggs their meat and feathers are useful. They also tend to eat pest insects. It's actually very efficient process.

If you worry about animal cruelty then work on that problem. But fake eggs? Talk about fixing what ain't broke.

Re: Why?

[jellomizer]

Then vegans need to get over themselves.
To try to get a balanced diet they are eating so much processed food to try to match what we get from a piece of cheese or an egg.

They talk about it being more environmentally friendly, however how many of these ingredients that you growing, then cutting, and processing the hell out of them are you using. You "egg" is made from an acre of Soybeans, don't you feel good about yourself, with a good portion of it going to waste. While my Egg is from a chicken that has eaten 1 acre of feed and produced hundreds of eggs during its lifetime. And the chicken works as a rather efficient little factory of making eggs.

Re: Why?

[mhansen444]

We're talking about vegans here, though, and if they enjoy their breakfasts so much, why do they need fake eggs? What's wrong with their normal vegan breakfast that they have to eat fake animal protein?

They aren't making egg replacements to cater to vegans. Think of all of the processed food like mayo, cookies, etc. which contains eggs. If they can create a cheaper, effective replacement for eggs then it would reduce the demand for factory farm produced eggs (which is how a majority of all eggs are produced).

Re: Why?

[amalcolm]

Did someone else's life choice hurt your feelings?

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Because if you ever saw the inside of an egg factory and how those chickens are treated, you would not want to ever give those people money again either. Or perhaps you still would. I suppose that would say a lot about a person's character.

Re: Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Did a simple and obvious solution to a problem that exists only in someone's mind hurt yours?

Re: Why?

[exploder]

Then vegans need to get over themselves

Stereotypes aside, can I just point out that the overwhelming majority of I-know-what's-good-for-you self-righteousness in these comments isn't coming from the vegans?

Re: Why?

[knightghost]

Ignoring that we are omnivores is unethical. Vegan is just a large fad clique based on marketing over science.

Re: Why?

[TheCarp]

Kind of reminds me of the country side of my family complaining about city folk who move out their way. "First they move outside the city, then they complain about the smell of cow shit, where did they think they were moving?"

Re: Why?

[Smauler]

Meateater here, and I absolutely agree with the above. I love vegetarian meals and dishes too (vegan is rarer, I love cheese), not every meal has to have meat. Anything that tries to emulate meat (or a different type of meat, eg. turkey ham, beef sausages) is diabolical. Spinach and ricotta is sublime (though again, not vegan obviously), and I've made decent tomato/bean/mushroom curries too (which would have been vegan without the bit of butter to fry in, which could easily be replaced).

Anyway, my point is that meat is meat and although there's nothing like a good steak, there are loads of good vegan meals everyone should be eating sometimes, and even more vegetarian meals. Fake meat should never be eaten by someone who eats meat... there's no point. If I were vegetarian or vegan, I would definitely not eat that processed crap still.

Re:Why? RTFA

[retroworks]

Carbon produced in food production is apparently greater than carbon produced in consumer transportation like cars. The non-egg food product is aimed at one of the most costly food production consumers, henhouses. The interest, and active investment, of Bill Gates, Li Ka-shing and Vinod Khosla indicates they RTFA.

Eggs are good for us

[judoguy]

For those of us who eat dead animals, eggs are health food. I eat 5-6 eggs a day for breakfast. Sometimes more later when I'm feeling lazy. I lost 40lbs and my cholesterol panels went form heart-attack-soon to teen age athlete levels.

All this stupid "Don't eat eggs or fat" bullshit is literally killing us.