Palm oil is in almost everything, and it’s devastating rainforests. This Bill Gates-backed company used microbes to create an alternative
Shara Ticku and David Heller, co-founders of C16 Biosciences.
Photo courtesy C16 Biosciences.
In July 2013, Shara Ticku traveled to Singapore on a work trip for Goldman Sachs. The investment bank made her bring N95 masks to protect her from the terrible air quality at the time.
“I land in Singapore, and the air quality index is over 400. Air quality index: anything over 300 is considered super toxic. In New York right now, it’s probably in the 20s, and that’s for a big city,” Ticku told CNBC in a video interview on Tuesday. “They closed schools, they told pregnant women they can’t walk outside. It was crazy. And I had no clue what was going on.”
Ticku asked her local colleagues who informed her that neighboring countries Indonesia and Malaysia were burning rain forests to make palm oil. “By the way, we deal with this every year,” they told her.
That was the first time Ticku ever heard about palm oil but the experience would stick with her.
Ticku went on to work for in health issues, first at the Clinton Health Access Initiative, then at the fertility benefits management company Progyny, and then at the United Nations as the Secretary General’s Special Envoy for Health and Malaria.
Shara Ticku, co-founder and CEO of C16 Biosciences, holding their palm oil alternative, Palmless.
Photo courtesy C16 Biosciences.
She also went back to school and got her MBA at Harvard, where she met Harry McNamara, who was then getting his PhD in physics at Harvard and his PhD in health sciences and technology at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and David Heller, who was studying biological sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The three came together in a interdisciplinary class at the MIT Media Lab whose goal was for students to use their knowledge base to collaborate and solve a global challenge.
McNamara shared his experience of visiting Costa Rica with some friends to see the rainforest and seeing rows of systematically planted oil palms. When McNamara told Ticku and Heller about his experience, Ticku had a distinct feeling of déjà vu.
These experiences became the catalyst for the company that is now C16 Biosciences, which has raised $24 million from investors including Breakthrough Energy Ventures, the climate tech investing firm funded by Bill Gates.
On Thursday, C16 Biosciences is announcing the launch of Palmless, a palm oil alternative it’s invented and been able to produce at scale.
C16 Biosciences, named after the 16-carbon fatty acid that is of the primary components of palm oil and its microbial alternative, has produced 50,000 liters of its commercial-grade product. The company says it will begin appearing in beauty products next year, but declined to identify any of its customers.
What is palm oil and why is it a climate hazard?
Part of what makes palm oil so dangerous is its ubiquity: It’s found in more than half of the packaged products Americans use, including ice cream, lipstick, soaps and detergents, according to the World Wildlife Fund. It makes up 40 percent of traded vegetable oils, according to a paper published in CABI Agriculture and Bioscience, and the industry produces 81 million tonnes per year — almost as much as the next two largest vegetable oil crops, soybean and rapeseed, combined.
Palm oil grows best in the regions right around the equator, so palm oil producers chop down rainforest and clear that felled vegetation by burning it, making it a prime target of conservation organizations like the Rainforest Rescue and the World Wildlife Fund.
Palm oil trees grow at the Cikasungka palm oil plantation, operated by PT Perkebunan Nusantara VIII, in Bogor Regency in West Java, Indonesia, on Monday, June 20, 2022. Indonesia has slashed the maximum crude palm oil export levy by nearly half in another step to speed up shipments after lifting a temporary export ban on the commodity last month.
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images
“It’s truly slashing and burning: Burn the trees, cut down the trees, and then they burn the peatlands that the trees sit on top of, which makes it a double whammy for carbon dioxide emissions because the trees hold carbon and the peatlands hold carbon,” Ticku said. Peatlands are marshy, boggy, wet land which are known to be tremendous carbon sinks.
Burning the forests also releases greenhouse gases, as does creating the fertilizer used by these plantations.
Palm oil plantations also affect biodiversity. The rainforest that gets cleared to make palm oil is home to endangered species including rhinos, elephants and tigers, according to the WWF. Clearcutting land in Borneo and Sumatra for palm oil agriculture is the greatest threat to orangutans, according to the Orangutan Foundation International.
A Forest was recently cleared up to plant oil palm trees in Rawa Singkil WIldlife reserve, on June 15, 2017 in Aceh, Indonesia. Global Forest Watch released the latest data showing that tree cover loss in Indonesia remains high and the acceleration can be largely attributed to massive expansion of oil palm plantations. Nearly half of the tree cover loss occurred in the Kalimantan region, where palm oil plantations have grown enormously since 2005 while in Sumatra, tree cover loss slowedbut only because the region no longer has accessible primary forest to cut.
Future Publishing | Future Publishing | Getty Images
“The thing about deforestation is nobody wants you to know that they’re doing it. People really try to hide it,” Ticku told CNBC. That makes it hard to track greenhouse gasses associated with palm oil production.
A 2018 analysis from the International Council on Clean Transportation estimated that land use changes in Indonesia and Malaysia emitted approximately 500 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent each year. At the time, that was 1.4 percent of global net CO2 equivalent emission, which was almost as much as the aviation sector and more than the state of California emitted, the ICCT said.
Nonetheless, the industry continues to grow. The global palm oil market was valued at $63.7 billion in 2021 is expected to continue to grow to reach $98.9 billion in 2030, according to a report published in May from Grand View Research, a global market research firm.
That’s because palm oil is relatively inexpensive and “so damn good at what it does,” Ticku said. “Palm oil is used in most candies that have a chocolate coating, and it is truly the thing that is responsible for making chocolate melt in your mouth and not in your hand, because it’s got a melting profile that melts at body temp and not at room temperature.”
Environmental activists at ‘The Human Orangutan Conflict Response Unit – Orangutan Information Center’ (HOCRU – OIC) saves the Sumatran orangutan trapped in oil palm plantations on June 10, 2017 in North Sumatra, Indonesia, It is illegal to capture, kill, or keep orangutans as pets in Indonesia, prosecutions are rare and orangutan often meet this fate. Adult orangutan with her son is one of the ‘lucky’ that was saved by The Human Orangutan Conflict Response Unit – Orangutan Information Center (HOCRU – OIC) and taken to the forest Gunung Leuser National Park after being stuck on palm oil plantations. Sumatran orangutans (Pongo abelii) are a distinct species and listed as Endangered by the World Conservation Union (IUCN) on their Red List of Threatened Species. The Sumatran orangutan is considered the more immediately in danger of extinction, with only around 6,600 or so left in the wild today, and is therefore classified as Critically Endangered. The species is also listed on Appendix 1 of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), under which animals smuggled out of their natural range country and confiscated should whenever possible be repatriated and returned to the wild.
Future Publishing | Future Publishing | Getty Images
Using yeast to solve the problem
When the C16 team was getting started in 2017, the idea of using biotechnology to make consumer products was relatively new, but Impossible Foods had just released its burger, which uses fermentation of yeast to make heme, the protein that makes a product taste meat-like.
“People began to really think long and hard about what what does it mean to consume and use products that were developed with biotechnology,” Heller told CNBC in an interview at C16 Biosciences’ company headquarters in Manhattan on Tuesday.
Investors are betting that customers are ready for those alternatives. “Consumers are increasingly more aware of the climate problem, which includes the deforestation involved in palm oil production, and are looking for ways they can contribute with their purchasing power,” Carmichael Roberts, one half of the investing committee for Gates’ climate investing firm, told CNBC.
To make its palm oil alternative, C16 Biosciences uses a wild type yeast microbe that makes a functional equivalent to palm oil with a kind of fermentation process. And fermentation — which is what has been used to make wine, beer and cheese for ages — is a “really, really robust, scalable process,” Heller said.
The firm was able to move so fast in part because microbes speed up research and development.
“We can design an experiment and start it and get a learning about whether that helped us produce better and more oil within about seven days,” Heller said. “It takes about one week from end to end.” By comparison, trying a new seed at a palm oil plantation takes more like seven years.
The C16 Biosciences labratory in Manhattan.
Photo courtesy: Cat Clifford, CNBC
Chemically, the palm oil that C16 Biosciences makes is not identical to the palm oil that is grown in industrial agriculture farms. However, “it contains the same fatty acids, which are the molecular fingerprints of fats and oils, that palm oil does,” Heller told CNBC. “And that’s a really important characteristic that allows our oil to function in the same kind of end products in the food and beauty and personal care space as palm oil does.”
While C16 Biosciences is launching in 2023 with beauty products, it’s not yet applied for approval from the United States Food and Drug Administration to be included in food products.
Right now, C16, with 35 employees and $24 million in total venture capital, is laser-focused on scaling up its palm oil alternative and simultaneously bringing the price down.
“But what we are building is a platform technology that can produce all different kinds of microbial oils,” Heller told CNBC. “So it’s definitely possible that we’re able to make other kinds of vegetable oil replacements in the future.”
Formula One F1 – United States Grand Prix – Circuit of the Americas, Austin, Texas, U.S. – October 23, 2022 Tim Cook waves the chequered flag to the race winner Red Bull’s Max Verstappen
Mike Segar | Reuters
Apple had two major launches last month. They couldn’t have been more different.
First, Apple revealed some of the artificial intelligence advancements it had been working on in the past year when it released developer versions of its operating systems to muted applause at its annual developer’s conference, WWDC. Then, at the end of the month, Apple hit the red carpet as its first true blockbuster movie, “F1,” debuted to over $155 million — and glowing reviews — in its first weekend.
While “F1” was a victory lap for Apple, highlighting the strength of its long-term outlook, the growth of its services business and its ability to tap into culture, Wall Street’s reaction to the company’s AI announcements at WWDC suggest there’s some trouble underneath the hood.
“F1” showed Apple at its best — in particular, its ability to invest in new, long-term projects. When Apple TV+ launched in 2019, it had only a handful of original shows and one movie, a film festival darling called “Hala” that didn’t even share its box office revenue.
Despite Apple TV+ being written off as a costly side-project, Apple stuck with its plan over the years, expanding its staff and operation in Culver City, California. That allowed the company to build up Hollywood connections, especially for TV shows, and build an entertainment track record. Now, an Apple Original can lead the box office on a summer weekend, the prime season for blockbuster films.
The success of “F1” also highlights Apple’s significant marketing machine and ability to get big-name talent to appear with its leadership. Apple pulled out all the stops to market the movie, including using its Wallet app to send a push notification with a discount for tickets to the film. To promote “F1,” Cook appeared with movie star Brad Pitt at an Apple store in New York and posted a video with actual F1 racer Lewis Hamilton, who was one of the film’s producers.
(L-R) Brad Pitt, Lewis Hamilton, Tim Cook, and Damson Idris attend the World Premiere of “F1: The Movie” in Times Square on June 16, 2025 in New York City.
Jamie Mccarthy | Getty Images Entertainment | Getty Images
Although Apple services chief Eddy Cue said in a recent interview that Apple needs the its film business to be profitable to “continue to do great things,” “F1” isn’t just about the bottom line for the company.
Apple’s Hollywood productions are perhaps the most prominent face of the company’s services business, a profit engine that has been an investor favorite since the iPhone maker started highlighting the division in 2016.
Films will only ever be a small fraction of the services unit, which also includes payments, iCloud subscriptions, magazine bundles, Apple Music, game bundles, warranties, fees related to digital payments and ad sales. Plus, even the biggest box office smashes would be small on Apple’s scale — the company does over $1 billion in sales on average every day.
But movies are the only services component that can get celebrities like Pitt or George Clooney to appear next to an Apple logo — and the success of “F1” means that Apple could do more big popcorn films in the future.
“Nothing breeds success or inspires future investment like a current success,” said Comscore senior media analyst Paul Dergarabedian.
But if “F1” is a sign that Apple’s services business is in full throttle, the company’s AI struggles are a “check engine” light that won’t turn off.
Replacing Siri’s engine
At WWDC last month, Wall Street was eager to hear about the company’s plans for Apple Intelligence, its suite of AI features that it first revealed in 2024. Apple Intelligence, which is a key tenet of the company’s hardware products, had a rollout marred by delays and underwhelming features.
Apple spent most of WWDC going over smaller machine learning features, but did not reveal what investors and consumers increasingly want: A sophisticated Siri that can converse fluidly and get stuff done, like making a restaurant reservation. In the age of OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Anthropic’s Claude and Google’s Gemini, the expectation of AI assistants among consumers is growing beyond “Siri, how’s the weather?”
The company had previewed a significantly improved Siri in the summer of 2024, but earlier this year, those features were delayed to sometime in 2026. At WWDC, Apple didn’t offer any updates about the improved Siri beyond that the company was “continuing its work to deliver” the features in the “coming year.” Some observers reduced their expectations for Apple’s AI after the conference.
“Current expectations for Apple Intelligence to kickstart a super upgrade cycle are too high, in our view,” wrote Jefferies analysts this week.
Siri should be an example of how Apple’s ability to improve products and projects over the long-term makes it tough to compete with.
It beat nearly every other voice assistant to market when it first debuted on iPhones in 2011. Fourteen years later, Siri remains essentially the same one-off, rigid, question-and-answer system that struggles with open-ended questions and dates, even after the invention in recent years of sophisticated voice bots based on generative AI technology that can hold a conversation.
Apple’s strongest rivals, including Android parent Google, have done way more to integrate sophisticated AI assistants into their devices than Apple has. And Google doesn’t have the same reflex against collecting data and cloud processing as privacy-obsessed Apple.
Some analysts have said they believe Apple has a few years before the company’s lack of competitive AI features will start to show up in device sales, given the company’s large installed base and high customer loyalty. But Apple can’t get lapped before it re-enters the race, and its former design guru Jony Ive is now working on new hardware with OpenAI, ramping up the pressure in Cupertino.
“The three-year problem, which is within an investment time frame, is that Android is racing ahead,” Needham senior internet analyst Laura Martin said on CNBC this week.
Apple’s services success with projects like “F1” is an example of what the company can do when it sets clear goals in public and then executes them over extended time-frames.
Its AI strategy could use a similar long-term plan, as customers and investors wonder when Apple will fully embrace the technology that has captivated Silicon Valley.
Wall Street’s anxiety over Apple’s AI struggles was evident this week after Bloomberg reported that Apple was considering replacing Siri’s engine with Anthropic or OpenAI’s technology, as opposed to its own foundation models.
The move, if it were to happen, would contradict one of Apple’s most important strategies in the Cook era: Apple wants to own its core technologies, like the touchscreen, processor, modem and maps software, not buy them from suppliers.
Using external technology would be an admission that Apple Foundation Models aren’t good enough yet for what the company wants to do with Siri.
“They’ve fallen farther and farther behind, and they need to supercharge their generative AI efforts” Martin said. “They can’t do that internally.”
Apple might even pay billions for the use of Anthropic’s AI software, according to the Bloomberg report. If Apple were to pay for AI, it would be a reversal from current services deals, like the search deal with Alphabet where the Cupertino company gets paid $20 billion per year to push iPhone traffic to Google Search.
The company didn’t confirm the report and declined comment, but Wall Street welcomed the report and Apple shares rose.
In the world of AI in Silicon Valley, signing bonuses for the kinds of engineers that can develop new models can range up to $100 million, according to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.
“I can’t see Apple doing that,” Martin said.
Earlier this week, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg sent a memo bragging about hiring 11 AI experts from companies such as OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google’s DeepMind. That came after Zuckerberg hired Scale AI CEO Alexandr Wang to lead a new AI division as part of a $14.3 billion deal.
Meta’s not the only company to spend hundreds of millions on AI celebrities to get them in the building. Google spent big to hire away the founders of Character.AI, Microsoft got its AI leader by striking a deal with Inflection and Amazon hired the executive team of Adept to bulk up its AI roster.
Apple, on the other hand, hasn’t announced any big AI hires in recent years. While Cook rubs shoulders with Pitt, the actual race may be passing Apple by.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk speaks alongside U.S. President Donald Trump to reporters in the Oval Office of the White House on May 30, 2025 in Washington, DC.
Kevin Dietsch | Getty Images
Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who bombarded President Donald Trump‘s signature spending bill for weeks, on Friday made his first comments since the legislation passed.
Musk backed a post on X by Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., who said the bill’s budget “explodes the deficit” and continues a pattern of “short-term politicking over long-term sustainability.”
The House of Representatives narrowly passed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act on Thursday, sending it to Trump to sign into law.
Paul and Musk have been vocal opponents of Trump’s tax and spending bill, and repeatedly called out the potential for the spending package to increase the national debt.
On Monday, Musk called it the “DEBT SLAVERY bill.”
The independent Congressional Budget Office has said the bill could add $3.4 trillion to the $36.2 trillion of U.S. debt over the next decade. The White House has labeled the agency as “partisan” and continuously refuted the CBO’s estimates.
The bill includes trillions of dollars in tax cuts, increased spending for immigration enforcement and large cuts to funding for Medicaid and other programs.
It also cuts tax credits and support for solar and wind energy and electric vehicles, a particularly sore spot for Musk, who has several companies that benefit from the programs.
“I took away his EV Mandate that forced everyone to buy Electric Cars that nobody else wanted (that he knew for months I was going to do!), and he just went CRAZY!” Trump wrote in a social media post in early June as the pair traded insults and threats.
Shares of Tesla plummeted as the feud intensified, with the company losing $152 billion in market cap on June 5 and putting the company below $1 trillion in value. The stock has largely rebounded since, but is still below where it was trading before the ruckus with Trump.
Tesla one-month stock chart.
— CNBC’s Kevin Breuninger and Erin Doherty contributed to this article.
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