# Shiru

> Shiru is an Alameda, California biotech that uses AI to find useful proteins hiding in nature and turn them into ingredients food and cosmetics companies can actually buy. Founded in 2019 by protein biochemist Jasmin Hume, it runs a machine-learning engine called Flourish, a 33-million-molecule marketplace called ProteinDiscovery.ai, and has already shipped OleoPro, a plant-protein fat that stands in for palm oil, coconut oil, and animal fat with up to 90% less saturated fat.

- **Founded:** 2019
- **Headquarters:** Alameda, California, United States
- **Founders:** Jasmin Hume (CEO & Founder)
- **Team size:** ~25 employees
- **Products:** Flourish, OleoPro, uPro, ProteinDiscovery.ai, C-OleoPro / C-uPro
- **Notable:** ProteinDiscovery.ai named to TIME's Best Inventions of 2024, Named a 2025 Technology Pioneer by the World Economic Forum, Featured in C&EN's 10 Start-Ups to Watch 2025

## Products & services

- **Flourish** — Shiru's proprietary AI and machine-learning discovery engine. It scans natural protein sequences, predicts functional attributes and how efficiently a protein can be produced, and narrows millions of candidates down to a handful worth testing - compressing discovery timelines from 5-15 years to roughly 1-2 years.
- **OleoPro** — A protein-based structured fat: an oleogel of potato protein and unsaturated liquid oil that stays solid at room temperature, browns when cooked, and delivers a rich, fatty mouthfeel. It replaces palm oil, coconut oil, and animal fat with up to 90% less saturated fat. Shiru's first commercialized AI-discovered ingredient; reached commercial scale in 2025.
- **uPro** — A texturizing plant-based protein for food applications, produced at commercial scale alongside OleoPro.
- **ProteinDiscovery.ai** — An interactive marketplace and discovery suite billed as the world's first protein marketplace - a searchable catalog of 33 million-plus molecules from plants, algae, and microbes. Users search by sequence, functional use, and expression success, test candidates, and can purchase property rights. Named to TIME's Best Inventions of 2024.
- **C-OleoPro / C-uPro** — Personal-care variants of Shiru's protein ingredients - a protein-based emollient and an emulsifying protein for skin and hair care formulations.

## Achievements

- ProteinDiscovery.ai named to TIME's Best Inventions of 2024
- Named a 2025 Technology Pioneer by the World Economic Forum
- Featured in C&EN's 10 Start-Ups to Watch 2025
- Launched OleoPro - reported as the first commercialized AI-discovered food ingredient (2023)
- Reached commercial scale for OleoPro and uPro in 2025
- Awarded a key patent for its protein discovery platform
- Launched out of Y Combinator (Summer 2019)

## Latest updates

- **2025-11** — Named to C&EN's 10 Start-Ups to Watch 2025, with Shiru ingredients expected on shelves by 2026.
- **2025-06** — Named a 2025 Technology Pioneer by the World Economic Forum and launched a GLP-1 Innovation Alliance around natural GLP-1 activation.
- **2025-04** — OleoPro and uPro reached commercial scale.
- **2025-03** — Announced a partnership with GreenLab to scale proteins via a corn-based expression system.
- **2024-11** — Closed a $16M Series B led by S2G Ventures.
- **2024-10** — ProteinDiscovery.ai named to TIME's Best Inventions of 2024.
- **2024-05** — Launched ProteinDiscovery.ai, a marketplace of 33 million-plus molecules.

## Links

- Website: https://shiru.com
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/shiru-inc
- Twitter/X: https://x.com/shiruinc
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/shiru_inc/

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/shiru
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-08-19