The first lab-grown chocolate bars are Israeli

Laboratory-made chocolate bars, @Celleste Bio

A revolution for the chocolate industry is underway. Israeli startup Celleste Bio, backed by Mondelez International, the owner of Cadbury, has created the world’s first laboratory-cultivated chocolate bars. The breakthrough confections were produced using cell-cultivated cocoa butter at Cadbury’s factory in Bournville, Birmingham, England.

This remarkable achievement could eventually reshape industrial chocolate production by reducing dependence on cocoa plantations in West Africa.

In recent years, unfavorable weather conditions linked to climate change have significantly reduced cocoa yields and driven prices sharply higher. Cocoa prices have risen from less than $3,000 per ton to more than $12,000 in just two years. We had the privilege of interviewing Michal Beressi Golomb, CEO of the company founded in 2022, to better understand the implications of this major turning point for the industry.

An Alternative to Growing Challenges

“Creating a technology capable of producing real cocoa butter required an enormous amount of precision and patience. Cocoa butter is a very specific fat that depends on achieving the perfect combination of factors, including the right fatty acid profile and triglyceride composition. Cocoa beans naturally produce this inside a cocoa pod on a tree. We therefore had to recreate an environment that perfectly mimics those natural conditions, but within a fully controlled setting, so the cells develop as if they were still in their natural habitat,” Michal Beressi Golomb told Itonnews.

Chocolate manufacturers can now use Celleste Bio’s cocoa butter as a direct replacement without changing any part of their existing production process.

“We take a bean from a cocoa pod, extract the cells responsible for producing cocoa butter, and place them into a bioreactor containing sugar, water, vitamins, and minerals. The cells then multiply and form cocoa biomass. We subsequently extract the butter and restart the growth cycle,” explains Michal Beressi Golomb.

BioLaboratory-made chocolate, @Celleste Bio

The technology developed by Celleste Bio is highly scalable. The company has built a robust cocoa cell bank containing multiple cocoa varieties and strains, along with a process capable of producing consistent and reproducible batches of cocoa butter.

Ensuring Long-Term Sustainability

Global cocoa butter consumption currently stands at approximately 2 million tons per year.

For now, this innovation is intended to complement traditional agriculture rather than replace it. Conventional cocoa farming remains essential, but the current supply chain is fragile, climate-dependent, and highly vulnerable to disease outbreaks and fluctuating yields.

Environmental responsibility and economic efficiency are central to the company’s model. According to Michal Beressi Golomb, resilience also means long-term viability: the business model itself must remain sustainable over time.

Future environmental and economic gains are expected to come from improved cellular productivity, water recycling, renewable energy integration, and the ability to manufacture cocoa ingredients closer to end-consumer markets.

Chocolate bar, @Celleste Bio

As a result, the future of chocolate production could become hybrid in terms of manufacturing systems, while preserving the traditional chocolate experience consumers know and love.

“The industry will require multiple solutions: better agricultural practices, improved compensation for farmers, genetic improvements, sustainability programs, and new production systems like ours,” she said.

A Highly Promising Future

Success would position Celleste Bio as the first “cocoa-tech” company capable of producing real cocoa butter at industrial scale.

Looking ahead ten years, Celleste Bio envisions itself not merely as an experimental scientific project, but as an integrated player within the global cocoa supply chain — a reliable supplier of premium authentic cocoa ingredients helping stabilize the market, reduce pressure on agricultural land, and preserve chocolate for future generations.

The company aims to secure regulatory approvals in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Israel in time for a market launch by the end of 2027.

Without seeking to completely replace traditional agriculture, Celleste Bio is betting on a model capable of securing cocoa production while reducing environmental pressure — a path that already appears well underway for the startup that has successfully taken on a bold and delicious challenge.

Caroline Haïat