Believer Meats plant heads to auction as receiver reshuffles the deadlines

UPSIDE Foods' $50m offer sets the floor for a stalled cultivated-meat plant, but the auction is still open to higher bids.

Believer Meats, legally Future Meat Technologies, is being broken up in receivership after ceasing operations in December and entering a general receivership in early February. UPSIDE Foods has submitted a $50 million asset purchase agreement, approved by the North Carolina Business Court as the baseline stalking horse bid. BDO Consulting Group is now marketing the assets to draw a higher offer, and the receiver won court approval to push the initial bid deadline from July 20 to August 10, with an auction set for August 17 and a sale hearing on August 20.

The assets on the block include a Wilson, North Carolina production facility valued at $150 million, plus bioreactors, tanks, centrifuges and permits — though equipment leased from CSC Leasing and Roberts Oxygen is excluded. A separate Israeli trustee is running a parallel process for the intellectual property, with that deadline extended to August 5. The company had raised nearly $400 million from backers including ADM Ventures and Tyson Ventures. Gray Construction has alleged in a lawsuit it is owed $36.4 million for work on the site, and Ameris Bank holds a $25 million term loan with senior secured status.

For cultivated protein, this is a setback. A plant built to make lab-grown meat affordable at scale is instead being liquidated, and even the marquee bidder values the whole operation at a fraction of its facility's stated worth — a signal that scale-up economics are not yet working.

Watch whether qualifying bids beat the $50 million floor by August 17, and whether facility buyers also want the IP — a detail court filings have not disclosed.

Source: AgFunder News