Brevel has officially entered the plant cell-culture market through a partnership with coffee cell-culture company Coffeesai, aiming to scale up production and enhance nutrient yields.

The collaboration validates Brevel’s proprietary illuminated fermentation platform, a biomanufacturing technology designed to overcome major scaling challenges by using light to accelerate the transition from lab research to commercial volumes.

Traditional agriculture remains heavily dependent on weather, seasons, and water availability, meaning a single bad year can cause entire supply chains to fall apart. Plant cell culture (PCC) changes this equation by directly growing single plant cells in suspension. This method generates consistent output with minimal land and water use, enabling year-round production regardless of outside conditions. This climate resilience is increasingly vital for crops like high-quality Arabica coffee, which is highly sensitive to temperature shifts; climate change is projected to make up to 50% of current coffee-growing land unusable by 2050.

Taking fermentation out of the dark

Brevel’s technology addresses the limitations of traditional dark fermentation by combining controlled fermentation with light in a closed system on a commercial scale.

By unlocking light-driven metabolism, the platform uses precise light profiles to gently trigger cells to produce beneficial natural compounds. This process delivers consistent and continuous generation of valuable natural compounds, improves metabolite profiles — including phenols and other bioactive ingredients — supports higher growth rates, and optimises overall yield and costs.

In the R&D trials with Coffeesai, controlled light exposure within the fermenter was used to actively influence the cell’s output. Manipulating the specific light profile was observed to modulate the expression of desirable value-added compounds, successfully enhancing the flavour and aroma characteristics of the resulting coffee biomass. Success in these trials was defined by achieving stable, high-density cultivations alongside measurable, light-dependent improvements in quality attributes.

“Our work in coffee cell cultures serves as a case study for the capabilities of our illuminated fermentation infrastructure,” explained Yonatan Golan, CEO and co-founder of Brevel. “Our recent work has demonstrated the platform’s ability to achieve high cell densities while sustaining continuous growth through an advanced semi-continuous cultivation process, paving the way for scalable and efficient production.”

Ami Herman, CEO of Coffeesai, noted that they are “encouraged by the initial results from Brevel’s platform and its potential to influence certain aspects of the sensory profile” as they continue to determine future production pathways.

Funding and commercial scale-up

To support this expansion, the Israel Innovation Authority has granted Brevel USD 1 million specifically to extend the illuminated fermentation platform to plant cell-culture companies and adjacent industries. As part of a broader strategy to support innovators working with light-driven biology, Brevel has also partnered with US-based plant cell technology company Ayana Bio as well as a cocoa cell-culture startup.

Brevel deploys a three-phase business model to bring these high-value products to market:

1. Development stage: initiation of feasibility and proof-of-concept projects.
2. Scale-up stage: pilot production at Brevel’s manufacturing facility, which operates illuminated fermenters at scales of 50L, 500L, and 5,000L under FSSC 22000 and HACCP food quality certifications.
3. Commercial stage: full production of high-value products at Brevel or within established joint ventures and manufacturing partnerships.