Genie Enterprise, an Israeli food tech startup develops small-size smart ovens it says can cook healthy, tasty and affordable meals into a restaurant-grade meal in 2-3 minutes, today its Series A round of financing, which was oversubscribed at $10 million.
The company works in collaboration with top chefs to create a variety of nutritious meals from fresh dried ingredients without any preservatives, artificial flavorings, colorings, or additives and come in pre-sealed individual pods.
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Genie’s system is based on unique technology and algorithms.
With prior success with Israeli governmental agencies and B2B businesses such as Apple in Israel, Genie Enterprise is ready to tap the U.S. for market opportunities.
Genie was co-founded in 2014 by CTO Doron Marco, CEO Ayelet Carasso-Sternberg and Dan Ariely, who is also an investor in the company.
“We are excited and encouraged by the reception we’ve found in the U.S. market for our product,” said CEO Ayelet Carasso-Sternberg, “Convenience, speed, and healthy eating are demanded by today’s lifestyles and we developed the Genie food system to solve these demands by providing real, natural, delicious food quickly and easily.”
Warren H. Feder, a Partner at Carl Marks Advisors said: ”What led us to support and invest in Genie Enterprise is its impressive track record in Israel, the vision and strength of Genie’s inventors and co-founders Doron Marco and Ayelet Carasso-Sternberg, and the enormous market opportunities we see in the U.S. We believe that Genie is a game changer and will capture significant U.S. market share by bringing its revolutionary food system to businesses and organizations, feeding people tasty and healthy meals conveniently and economically.”
Fresh dried ingredients for each Genie meal are contained in a pre-sealed individual pod with a barcode unique to that meal printed on the outside. The Genie smart oven scans the bar code which tells it how to cook each meal in a proprietary sequence unique to each dish – from heating, cooling, agitating, microwaving and steaming. Initially, Genie will offer a selection of 8 meals in the U.S. market, such as pasta Bolognese, chicken with broccoli in an Alfredo sauce, oatmeal with apples and cinnamon and molten chocolate lava cake – each prepared by top chefs made from real fresh dried ingredients sourced in the U.S.
Genie’s business model is based on its customers buying, eating and replenishing its meals. Genie Enterprise launched commercially in Israel in 2017 and targets businesses and government entities. The company co-owns a pod-filling facility in Northern Israel that has the capacity to manufacture 10 million meals per year. Genie Enterprise believes it possesses the only technology available today that can produce a restaurant quality meal from freeze-dried ingredients at the touch of a button.
Carl Marks Securities LLC led the financing round. The capital raised will build Genie’s in the US where its product is suited for offices, coffee chains, hotels, hospitals and countless other places that have a need for convenient food at the touch of a button.
