Perfect Day

Perfect Day, Inc. produces dairy proteins such as whey without cows, using microflora engineered to express milk protein genes and grown in fermentation tanks. The protein is sold as an ingredient to food companies for ice cream, cream cheese, baked goods and protein powders, and the company now markets a premium protein called ProFerm. It was incorporated on April 28, 2014 as Muufri by bioengineers Ryan Pandya and Perumal Gandhi, with Isha Datar of New Harvest helping start the project, and was renamed Perfect Day in 2016. It is based in Berkeley, California.

Horizons Ventures, the Hong Kong firm founded by Solina Chau, was an early backer, and Wikipedia reports $61.5 million raised from 2014 to 2019, chiefly from Horizons and Temasek. SEC Form D filings show $11.75 million sold in a 2018 offering and $23.0 million in early 2019. In December 2019 the company announced a $140 million Series C led by Horizons Ventures and Temasek; a Form D records $139,999,730 sold. In July 2020 the Series C was expanded to $300 million, with CPP Investments putting in $50 million, taking total funding past $360 million. On September 30, 2021 Perfect Day raised a $350 million Series D led by Temasek and CPP Investments, with Horizons Ventures, Bob Iger and SK Inc. participating, for $750 million raised to date. Iger joined the board in October 2020.

After the Series D the company ran three units: ingredients, a consumer brands arm called The Urgent Company (Brave Robot ice cream, Modern Kitchen cream cheese) and an enterprise biology business. On January 5, 2024 it announced a pre-Series E financing of up to $90 million led by internal investors. At the same time the founders left their operating roles, president TM Narayan became interim CEO, and Aftab Mathur of Temasek and Patrick Zhang of Horizons Ventures became co-chairmen, with the company refocusing on scaled whey protein manufacturing and a path to profitability. A Form D filed that month reported $45.0 million sold of a $90 million offering. No valuation has been disclosed.

Perfect Day shows the cost of building a new food ingredient at industrial scale. Horizons Ventures entered at seed and sovereign and pension investors (Temasek, CPP Investments) supplied most of the capital in 2019 to 2021. By 2024 the company was raising from existing holders, and the board had moved from founder control to its largest investors. No exit has been announced.