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Business Times
13 hours ago
- Business
- Business Times
Beyond Meat misses quarterly revenue estimates as plant-based demand weakens
BEYOND Meat missed Wall Street estimates for second-quarter revenue on Wednesday, hurt by weak demand for its plant-based meat products in the US amid ongoing macroeconomic uncertainty. Shares of the company, which also announced a 6 per cent reduction in its global workforce, fell about 4 per cent after the bell. US consumer demand for plant-based meat continued to decline this quarter amid skepticism over taste, processing and price. Macroeconomic uncertainty has pressured consumer spending in the US, prompting many to opt for cheaper animal protein. 'Consumers' growing concerns about processed foods are severely diminishing the appeal of Beyond Meat's product line, causing retailers and quick service restaurants to pull back sharply on orders,' Rachel Wolff, analyst at Emarketer, said. Retail sales of refrigerated plant-based meat alternative products in the US have fallen 17.2 per cent so far this year, and frozen plant-based meat alternatives have fallen 8.1 per cent, according to data from SPINS. BT in your inbox Start and end each day with the latest news stories and analyses delivered straight to your inbox. Sign Up Sign Up The El Segundo-based company said it will lay off 44 North American employees to cut costs, incurring a one-time charge of US$0.8 million to US$1.3 million. Revenue for the quarter ended June 28 fell nearly 20 per cent to US$75 million, compared with analysts' average estimate of US$82 million, according to data compiled by LSEG. It also reported a loss per share of 43 cents, compared with estimates of a 37-cent loss. The company withdrew its annual sales target, citing macroeconomic volatility, earlier in May. REUTERS
Los Angeles Times
29-07-2025
- Business
- Los Angeles Times
This robot uses Japanese tradition and AI for sashimi that lasts longer and is more humane
A local startup is using artificial intelligence and robotics in an unlikely way: making sashimi and other fish dishes taste better, last longer and more humane. El Segundo-based Shinkei Systems wants to bring a traditional Japanese method of handling fish to fine dining in America, using technology to replace the labor-intensive process historically handled by practitioners on board ships. Investors have just bet millions that it will succeed. The company's AI-driven robot — called Poseidon — has been designed to do a traditional form of fish handling called ikejime in Japanese. It is a method of killing fish that enthusiasts say enhances flavor, texture and shelf life. Although fish processed in this way is found in some of the best restaurants in Japan, it hasn't been promoted in the U.S. because it is generally too expensive. Automating the process will make it more readily available to Americans, said Saif Khawaja, the company's chief executive. 'My end goal is that you're walking into your local grocery store and can buy fish that lasts three times as long, tastes better and is handled humanely,' he said. The company raised $22 million in a funding round last month, co-led by Founders Fund and Interlagos, bringing total funding to $30 million since its inception. It has four Poseidons working on ships in the Pacific and Atlantic and hopes to have 10 more working in the coming year. The ikejime process involves taking live fish that has just been caught and quickly putting them out of their misery by killing them with a spike through the brain and cutting their gills. This stops the stress hormone and lactic acid buildup that can hurt flavor and texture when fish are left to asphyxiate. Although traditional practitioners sometimes add a step in which the spinal cord is destroyed, Poseidon just does the first steps of the ikejime technique. The method has remained largely artisanal even in Japan, where only some fishermen will make the effort to process batches of fish in this way to sell to specific sushi chefs who are obsessed with having the highest-quality ingredients. Even in Japan, the method, 'is still too labor-intensive to replicate at a high speed without damaging the fish,' Khawaja said, adding that, 'It's impractical and unsustainable for fishermen to adopt methods that require significant hands-on work,' in the U.S. Shinkei says it also has a higher calling than just better-tasting fish. Khawaja said one of the motivations for developing the technology was to try to find a kinder, gentler way to kill fish than letting them die gasping for air. During childhood fishing trips with his father in the Red Sea, he remembers it being 'very hard to watch' fish suffocating after they were caught. While he was in graduate school at the University of Pennsylvania, Khawaja was moved by an essay that argued that fish suffer inhumane deaths because they cannot vocalize pain. He even once considered developing sensors to make fish's pain audible. Shinkei provides Poseidon machines to fishermen, who then sell fish processed through the machines back to Shinkei at a premium. Shinkei in turn sells the fish to restaurants and other retailers underits fish company Seremoni. Poseidon is roughly refrigerator-sized and sits on fishing boat decks. It processes fish within seconds of being caught. The fish is fed through an opening in the machine and into a small vinyl cavity. The machine then uses AI to identify what kind of fish it is and where exactly its brain and gills are. Fish emerge with a hole in the head and incisions near the gills before being placed in an ice slurry for blood drainage. Quickly killing the fish, bleeding it and chilling it without freezing leads to fish that is noticeably better, Khawaja said. 'There's going to be a flavor profile difference and there's going to be texture profile difference,' he said. The company chose Los Angeles for its headquarters and production because it has the right mix of potential employees as well as customers. It has the mechanical engineering talent as well as a major fishing fleet and lots of high-end restaurants. 'The best mechanical engineering talent in the world, in my opinion, is in Southern California,' said Seremoni co-founder Reed Ginsberg. The city is also a major health and consumer products hub as well as a trend setter for cutting-edge food fads. Chef Michael Cimarusti, co-owner of the Michelin starred Providence restaurant in Los Angeles, says he tries to buy local ikejime fish when he can because it preserves the quality and color. The fish preserved using ikejime look as if they 'were just pulled from the water minutes ago,' he said in an interview posted on YouTube by the American Fishing Tackle Co. Shinkei currently processes thousands of pounds weekly across operations in Washington, Central California and Massachusetts, with expansion to Alaska and the Gulf of Mexico planned this year. After feedback from fishermen that the bots took up too much deck space, the company is developing 'Block 2' robots this year that will have roughly half the footprint while processing fish twice as fast. Currently, black cod and black sea bass processed through Poseidon are sold under Shinkei's brand Seremoni at retailers such as Happier Grocery and served at upscale restaurants including Atomix and Sushi Zo. This summer, the company plans to add salmon and red snapper to its offerings.
Los Angeles Times
20-07-2025
- Business
- Los Angeles Times
Nuclear Power Startups Are Heating up in Southern California, with Radiant's Ultra-Portable Microreactors a Major Player
What if you could deliver a megawatt of energy anywhere in the world a cargo container could be shipped? For an El Segundo-based company, this sci-fi-sounding dream may be much more 'next Tuesday' than 'next planet.' Radiant, a startup that is repackaging and refining traditional nuclear technology into a portable microreactor, is on the home stretch to development and testing of its prototype reactor following a $165 million Series C funding round (bringing total raised capital to $225 million) and the hiring of key executives, including Dr. Rita Baranwal, former U.S. Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Energy. Baranwal serves as Radiant's chief nuclear officer, and most recently worked at Westinghouse on their modular reactor program. The company also hired Mike Starrett as its first chief revenue officer. In fact, the company recently signed an agreement to build 26 microreactors, including 20 units for an as-yet-undisclosed customer. 'Our focus is on the portability of nuclear power because then you could put a reactor in a place where you would have never imagined possible in the past,' said Doug Bernauer, chief executive and founder of Radiant. 'We have ceramic-coated, poppy-seed-size fuel and helium coolant. That combination means you can't have a leak and you can't damage the environment – you can give people the option of picking a nuclear reactor generator over a diesel generator.' The company is on track to be the first to to develop and test its 1 megawatt (MW) Kaleidos microreactor at the U.S. Department of Energy's Idaho National Laboratory, which is scheduled for next year. The research design and its construction is being conducted by a team that has grown to about 100 employees. Radiant is among five nuclear developers that were announced as recipients of high-assay, low-enriched uranium to fuel reactor demonstrations. These companies, and a handful of others, are racing to be first to market with nuclear microreactors, which offer a clean energy source that can be deployed for a variety of uses that typically rely on diesel generators. They produce about 100 to 1,000 times less electricity than conventional reactors and can operate independent of an electric grid. Use cases include backup generators at infrastructure sites, like hospitals to remote power needs in off-grid areas such as military bases, data centers, ships, desalinization plants and specific industrial facilities. The company expects its nuclear microreactor to be competitive with diesel generators where diesel fuel is priced at $6.50 per gallon. That price is above the average price for diesel in the United States, but it can be well below pricing for fuel in other countries and distant areas that rely on generators for power. Microreactors can provide a steady energy source at a consistent price and will include enough fuel for several years. Nuclear fuel can be replenished in a portable manner. More importantly, the design has a passive cooling system that uses helium gas rather than water to cool the reactor. It is meltdown-proof and leak-safe, ensuring protection of people and the surrounding environment. 'We needed to make sufficient design progress to show the Department of Energy that this small startup in Southern California deserves its portion of this precious material it holds for the industry,' said Tori Shivanandan, Radiant chief operating officer. 'Now we have the funding, we have fuel, and we have the team. We're finalizing the design and getting parts on order. I like to say we have our shot on goal.' That design has been years in the making. The company moved into its current building in El Segundo, a former Hughes Aerospace warehouse, about three years ago, vacating a former dance studio that it used as an office. Leveling up in square footage was essential, as the company was rapidly growing and needed space for hardware to be delivered and the team to expand. The new location was great because it offered access to Southern California's vast talent pool of engineers, but it was in rough shape. Early employees sat in the dark as they worked through building renovations that added heating and air conditioning. Even now, the company temporarily ran out of desks for additional staff and Shivanandan said that she planned to sit in the kitchen for several days until new desks arrived. The genesis of the company was from the desire to explore space and inhabit Mars. Bernauer moved to California in 2007 to work as an engineer at SpaceX. The company was headquartered in El Segundo at the time, and he worked on the Falcon 1 rocket, Falcon 9 rocket and other projects promoted by Elon Musk, such as Hyperloop and the Boring Company, before pivoting to Mars colonization plans. He investigated ways to power development on our neighbor planet, and nuclear power generation compared favorably to other power sources, like solar. However, there were no companies that provided an off-the-shelf solution to launch a small nuclear reactor into space. He originally tried to develop a nuclear program within SpaceX but eventually decided to create Radiant in 2019. 'I started researching nuclear on nights and weekends, looking at Wikipedia, and my curiosity lead down the path of who can do nuclear now, how quickly can they do it and what does it cost?' said Bernauer, who provided some of the initial company funding himself. 'I was fully committed to making this thing happen.' Radiant is on target to construct its nuclear reactor and test it in 2026. With its recent round of funding, it anticipates that it has raised enough to carry it through construction of a prototype and testing in 2026 as well as the establishment of a larger scale manufacturing facility to ramp up production. At full capacity, the company expects to build about 50 microreactors per year. 'I was blown away by their capability and vision. The nuclear industry needed people from other sectors to come into nuclear because nuclear hadn't built anything new for a long time,' said Dr. Rachel Slaybaugh, partner at DCVC, the Palo Alto-based venture capital firm that led the Series C round. Slaybaugh is a trained nuclear scientist who taught at the University of California, Berkeley and previously served as an independent board member. 'Radiant has gone very fast with not very many resources.' There is a flurry of activity from established companies and startups looking to repackage nuclear energy at a variety of reactor sizes. At the smallest level, both startups and established nuclear companies are developing microreactors, which can be packaged and transported in a shipping container on a truck or even in an aircraft and deployed in a relatively short amount of time. Many of these companies are working with the U.S. Department of Energy's Idaho National Laboratory, which is where they will demonstrate and test microreactor designs. They are designed to use low-enriched uranium with higher concentrations of uranium-235 than the fuel used in conventional reactors. Companies developing microreactors include Torrance-based Antares, which opened a new 128,000-square-foot factory this year for research and development, component manufacturing, and assembly of its first microreactors. The company is targeting testing by 2027. It raised $30 million in Series A financing last year, co-led by Alt Cap and existing lead seed investor Caffeinated Capital, with participation from Rogue, Uncommon Capital, Shrug, Banter Capital, Box Group and Shine Capital. On a larger scale, small modular reactors are typically designed to be connected to an electric grid while providing 50 to 300 MW. TerraPower, a small modular reactor company that was founded by Bill Gates, is developing Natrium, a next-generation nuclear power plant. The Natrium reactor uses liquid sodium as a coolant rather than a traditional water-cooled reactor. Its first plant is a 345 MW facility that is currently under construction in Kemmerer, Wy., and includes a storage system that can boost output to 500 MW. It is being developed as part of a public-private partnership with the U.S. Department of Energy's Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program. In June, TerraPower announced that it raised an additional $650 million in funding from both new investors, including NVentures, the venture capital arm of NVIDIA, and current investors, including founder Bill Gates and HD Hyundai, an industry leader in shipbuilding. Gates has invested $1 billion in the company. Not to be outdone, tech giants such as Microsoft, Google and Amazon have also signed agreements to explore advanced nuclear technology. While this technology is expanding and the next-generation plants are exploring safer ways to cool reactors, conventional reactors have been phased out in California, and there have been very few new reactors built nationwide, primarily due to the Three Mile Island accident in 1979 and changing economics. In California, the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station was permanently closed in 2013 due to issues with its steam generators. Diablo Canyon Power Plant, which is operated by PG&E, is the only conventional nuclear power plant in California and was in the process of being decommissioned, but a state decision to extend operations through at least 2030 is in place with the possibility of further extensions. Public perception is changing due to increased power demands and the fragile electric grid in the United States. In June, New York Governor Kathy Hochul directed the state's public electric utility to develop and construct an advanced nuclear power plant in Upstate New York with a capacity of one gigawatt of electricity. Furthermore, the nuclear industry has received boosts from the Trump administration, which signed several executive orders to advance nuclear power. Some Army installations could be powered by nuclear microreactors under a May 2025 executive order calling for deploying advanced nuclear reactor technologies. The order, citing national security concerns, directs the Army to establish a program utilizing the technology and requires operation of a nuclear reactor at a domestic military base or installation by Sept. 30, 2028. It is one of a series of orders that seeks to increase the amount of nuclear energy produced in the United States, which is estimated to produce only about 20% of its energy usage currently from nuclear sources. Those orders build on earlier projects. In 2022, the Defense Department awarded a $300-million contract to Lynchburg, Virginia-based BWX Technologies to develop a microreactor that could be transported by a C-17 cargo plane and set up to power a military base for several years before refueling. The U.S. military is a strong customer base for many aerospace and defense startups – and Radiant was selected as a finalist by the Defense Innovation Unit for a potential contract to have its reactor on a U.S. military base – Bernauer still has his eye towards the sky. 'What we have to do is get reactors operating for about five years and then take the thing apart and inspect it to see what's breaking and what's working well. From there, we can make extremely reliable reactors that can operate anywhere,' said Bernauer. 'I want to be able to eventually make the space reactor for Elon (Musk), but to do that, you need something highly reliable and transportable.'
Los Angeles Times
18-07-2025
- Business
- Los Angeles Times
El Segundo Investment Advisory Firm Kaye Capital Management Acquired
Modern Wealth Management, a registered investment advisor based in Monterey, reached an asset purchase agreement with El Segundo-based Kaye Capital Management, a fee-only registered investment advisor with over $700 million in assets under management and an additional $300 million in assets under advisement. With this transaction, Modern Wealth surpassed $8.5 billion in assets under management and completed its fourth acquisition of 2025. 'Kaye Capital Management joining Modern Wealth marks another significant milestone as we deepen our reach in California, strengthening our ability to deliver comprehensive wealth and retirement solutions for individuals and corporations in one of the nation's most sophisticated markets,' said Jason Gordo, co‑founder and president of Modern Wealth, in a statement. Kaye Capital Management executives Ken Watten and David Hilton both joined Modern Wealth as managing directors. Information for this article was sourced from Modern Wealth Management.
Los Angeles Times
09-07-2025
- Health
- Los Angeles Times
Mattel's newest Barbie has diabetes
Dressed in a matching polka dot tank top and ruffled skirt with blue chunky heeled boots and a mini purse, Mattel's newest Barbie may look like previous dolls at first glance. But this particular doll stands out with a wearable insulin pump on her waist, a glucose monitor on her arm and a phone showing her blood sugar readings, making her the El Segundo-based toy company's first Barbie with Type 1 diabetes. The doll continues Mattel's expansion of representation across its flagship brand. The Barbie Fashionistas line features more than 175 looks across various skin tones, body types and disabilities, including previous additions like a blind Barbie, a Barbie with Down syndrome and a Barbie with hearing aids. The company's commitment to representation has proved commercially successful. In 2024, the top 10 most popular Barbie Fashionista dolls globally included the blind Barbie and the Barbie with Down syndrome. The Fashionistas series also includes dolls with vitiligo, prosthetic limbs and wheelchairs. The wheelchair-using doll has consistently been a top performer since its introduction in 2019. Krista Berger, senior vice president of Barbie and global head of dolls at Mattel, said Barbie helps shape children's early perceptions of the world. Reflecting medical conditions like T1D ensures 'more kids can see themselves in the stories they imagine and the dolls they love.' The doll was developed with Breakthrough T1D, the leading global Type 1 diabetes research and advocacy organization. The partnership ensured medical accuracy while incorporating diabetes awareness symbols through the clothes' blue coloring and polka dot pattern. Aaron J. Kowalski, chief executive of Breakthrough T1D, said the partnership is about 'bringing greater visibility to a condition that affects so many families.' The doll launched Tuesday during Breakthrough T1D's 2025 Children's Congress in Washington, D.C. The event brings together more than 170 children living with Type 1 diabetes, giving them face time with members of Congress to advocate for ongoing funding for Type 1 diabetes research. This year they asked members of Congress to renew funding for the Special Diabetes Program. The Special Diabetes Program's current funding expires after September. The program, first allocated by Congress in 1997, faces uncertainty amid recent cuts to federally-funded projects. Type 1 diabetes is an autoimmune condition affecting nearly 9 million people globally, with about 352,000 children living with diabetes in the United States. The CDC reports that 1.7 million individuals 20 or older live with Type 1 diabetes and use insulin. The new Barbie is available through Mattel Shop and retailers nationwide.
