Soylent announces $20M series A, Led by Andreessen Horowitz, To handle large Backlog

Drink up.

January 14, 2015

Soylent buyers are not more than happy presently.

the company’s order backlog is very large, and still U.S.-only. New orders are transport only each five to 6 months, which, when you are the meal-skipping, physique-hacker type serious about issues like hyper-effectivity, is a yes buzzkill. which is mostly since the meal substitute drink of the future drummed up more hype than it used to be ready to handle. And whereas it managed to raise a $1.5 million funding round in late 2013, it hasn’t been able to keep up with purchaser demand.

today, although, Soylent is announcing something pretty important: A $20 million seed A spherical led (once more) by Andreessen Horowitz, with further participation from Lerer Ventures, Index Ventures, and a few different person investors. Andreessen’s Chris Dixon will also sign up for the corporate’s board.

the idea is that, with the additional funding and steering, Soylent will be capable of expand its manufacturing and transport capabilities. Already, the company says it’s opening up two additional manufacturing sites—which can be managed by using third events—to ramp up production. “attaining real-time achievement is our high precedence,” Soylent CEO Rob Rhinehart explains to me in an e-mail. “even if we’re unable to offer a precise estimate of when this may occur, our staff is working diligently to ensure that our buyers obtain their Soylent as quick as conceivable.”

Rhinehart would not say how massive the current backlog is, despite the fact that it is “vital,” and the corporate is “making some critical headway.” And, at the least for now, Soylent will proceed to rely on third-party producers to position its diet kits together.

“We plan to carry much of high quality regulate in house so as to be certain that stringent quality control requirements are met while simultaneously making improvements to production pace,” says Rhinehart. “In time more factors of manufacturing may be brought in home, however our primary focus will be the analysis and construction of ever more novel and efficient foodstuffs and substances.”

more (and most likely less gassy?) Soylent types are on the horizon, in different phrases. at least on every occasion they get to you.

[Screnshot: via Soylent]

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