Wanted to get Swedes to eat insects – now the company is going bankrupt

Tebrito in Orsa located in middle Sweden wanted to get Swedes to eat insects by producing food from industrially bred mealworms. Despite raising SEK 45 million (€3,84 million)  from investors, the company was unable to get its finances in order and has now been declared bankrupt.

Tebrito was founded in 2016 by Nils Österholm and Åsa Martén. When the Swedish National Food Agency announced just over three years ago that it would approve mealworms as food, many investors thought the company had a bright future. This was not the case.

“The company has worked hard to find a long-term, sustainable financial solution. But despite constructive dialogues with potentially very interesting partners with the aim of scaling up the company, it has unfortunately not been possible to solve the most acute financial situation”, founder Nils Österholm writes in a statement.

As recently as last year, Österholm claimed in an interview with Bonnier-owned DN that he was convinced that insects would soon become a natural part of grocery store shelves.

– One day we will get there. Right now there is a lot going on behind the scenes. It takes time to create a large enough production, to develop the product itself and the marketing, and to get all the approvals, he said.

Impact Loop notes that Mycorena – a company that “would change the entire food industry with its mushroom-based ingredients” – also recently went bankrupt, and that players involved in developing alternative protein sources are in a tough spot right now. This is partly explained by the fact that the summer is a “difficult time to secure capital”.

Last year, Tebrito had sales of SEK 531,000 (€45 200) and a loss of SEK 13.6 million (€1,16 million). Just last month, the company raised SEK 4.1 million (€350 000)  from outside investors – which does not seem to have helped.