The Sydney startup fighting climate change one cow burp at a time - with a low-cost feed additive and a six-month rumen bolus that cut livestock methane up to 90% in trials.
Livestock are among the planet's quietest big emitters. Cattle, sheep and goats digest grass through fermentation in the rumen, and a byproduct of that process is methane - a greenhouse gas belched into the air with every mouthful. Estimates put livestock at up to 15% of global emissions. Number 8 Bio was built to intercept that reaction before it reaches the sky.
Founded in 2022 in Sydney by two PhDs, Dr. Tom Williams and Dr. Alex Carpenter, the company develops feed technology that suppresses the microbes responsible for methane while recovering the energy those microbes would otherwise waste. The commercial product line is called BetterFeed: a feed additive for mixed-ration and milking-shed operations, and a slow-release bolus that sits in a grazing animal's stomach for up to six months.
The company's own framing is plain - "Changing Feed to Feed Positive Change." The pitch to farmers is equally plain: cut emissions and improve returns in the same decision.
"The thing that will be most successful has to be very low cost and very high efficacy."
Tom Williams, CEO & Co-FounderNumber 8 Bio started out engineering yeast to brew methane inhibitors, including bromoform - the active compound in red seaweed. Then it walked away from its own approach.
The reasoning was economic. Biomanufacturing and seaweed harvesting are expensive and hard to scale to paddock prices. Williams' team concluded that the winning product had to be cheap enough for a grazier to use across a whole herd. So they pivoted to synthetic chemistry: organic small molecules that the global chemical industry can manufacture at volume, combined with prebiotics.
Number 8 Bio holds the intellectual property on how those molecules are used in ruminants and on the ingredient combinations - but outsources the manufacturing itself. Asset-light where it can be, protected where it counts.
Two delivery formats built for how animals are actually fed - trough or paddock.
A capsule that sits in the rumen for up to six months, steadily releasing an organic small-molecule inhibitor with prebiotics. Designed for grass-fed cattle and sheep that can't be dosed daily - about 95% of Australia's livestock. Recaptures energy otherwise lost as methane to support growth and stocking rates.
A methane-reducing supplement for total-mixed-ration and milking-shed feeding, using non-bromoform synthetic small molecules chosen for low cost and feed-system compatibility. Built to fit existing feeding infrastructure rather than replace it.
"Several solutions will have to exist because farming is quite diverse."
Tom Williams, on why it isn't a winner-take-all marketNumber 8 Bio is a B2B agtech company. Its customers are livestock producers - primarily grass-fed cattle and sheep graziers in Australia, plus dairy and mixed-ration operations. Before commercial launch, a waitlist of more than 28 producers representing roughly two million head of livestock had already formed.
The revenue model is selling BetterFeed additives and boluses, with additional value tied to carbon-credit and emissions-reduction outcomes and to the productivity gains from recaptured feed energy. The product is designed, in the company's words, to pay for itself from day one - a deliberate answer to a hard truth in agtech: farmers buy returns, not climate promises.
Enteric-methane feed technology has become one of climate tech's more competitive corners. The field includes DSM-Firmenich's Bovaer (the additive 3-NOP), seaweed and bromoform players such as Rumin8, CH4 Global and Sea Forest, and various biomanufacturing efforts. Most were built with feedlots and daily feeding in mind.
Number 8 Bio's wedge is twofold: low-cost synthetic small molecules instead of exotic inputs, and a six-month bolus engineered for grazing animals nobody can dose every day. In a market Williams himself says will hold "several solutions," the company is aiming squarely at the pasture-based majority.
From an accelerator award to a Series A led out of New Zealand, with CSIRO-linked and Japanese climate capital along the way.
Williams and Carpenter launch Number 8 Bio and win the Positive Impact Award at the UNSW SynBio 10X Accelerator.
Early pre-seed funding to develop enteric methane reduction technology.
The company raises a seed round and shifts from yeast biomanufacturing to low-cost synthetic small molecules; BetterFeed takes shape.
Icehouse Ventures leads a Series A with Main Sequence and ONE Innovators as BetterFeed shows up to 90% methane cuts.
The company targets commercial-scale trials across Australia ahead of a planned market release.
It develops BetterFeed - low-cost feed additives and a slow-release rumen bolus that reduce enteric methane from cattle and sheep while recapturing wasted feed energy to improve productivity.
Trials have shown cuts of up to 90% in total-mixed-ration scenarios and around 50% in grass-fed bolus trials, with results varying by delivery format.
It was founded in 2022 in Sydney by Dr. Tom Williams (CEO) and Dr. Alex Carpenter, out of the UNSW SynBio 10X Accelerator.
Roughly A$18 million total, including a A$7M seed round in 2024 and a A$11M Series A led by Icehouse Ventures in November 2025.
The company is running commercial-scale trials with a target of wider release around 2026-2027, subject to trial outcomes and regulatory pathways.
Official channels and selected coverage. Video interviews and product demos were not publicly available at the time of writing.