Nuggs Creator Simulate Raises $50 Million – A Look at its History and Buyout of Simulate.com
The alternative meat firm that purchased Simulate.com last year raised another round of funding.
The alternative food market is growing. More people around the world are transitioning from a meat-based diet to plant-based substitutes.
In the U.S. in 2019, meat alternatives accounted for $939 million in sales for the plant-based food market. While that number is dwarfed by the meat industry, it shows a healthy consumer interest, which is being capitalized on by a number of firms.
One such firm is Simulate, a biotechnology firm founded in 2018. Simulate recently disclosed that it closed a Series B funding round worth $50 million, adding to the $11 million previously raised by the Fresh York-based startup.
Simulate started life as Nuggs. While it doesn’t seem to own Nuggs.com, relying on EatNuggs.com instead, the firm made a notable domain name purchase when it disclosed its rebrand to Simulate.
Yes, Simulate purchased Simulate.com just ahead of the firm disclosed its rebrand from Nuggs to Simulate in July 2020.
As with many domain acquisitions by startups, the purchase coincided with the firm completing a funding round. In this case, Simulate raised $4 million.
As stated by WHOIS history, Simulate completed the purchase of Simulate.com in March 2020, four months ahead of the firm disclosed its rebrand.
Simulate.com was sold by Future Media Architects Inc., a firm that owns a highly sought-following portfolio of premium domains counting Cool.com, Media.com, and AI.com.
While the price paid for Simulate.com was never revealed, we do know that domain brokers Saw.com facilitated the deal, thanks to a tweet from DomainInvesting.com’s Elliot Silver.
Since Simulate’s buyout of Simulate.com, the domain has become the brand’s digital focal point, with Nuggs now transitioning from a brand name to a product name.
Simulate spends heavily on social media ads and influencer partnerships to promote its products, appealing to a mass market through memes and fresh-age advertising. Yet, the contact point for its direct-to-consumer division is its domain, Simulate.com, which hosts a website that’s more akin to a software startup than a plant-based food creator.
Simulate has done something that the other big plant-based manufacturers failed to do – acquire a one-word .COM. Impossible Foods missed out on Impossible.com, while Beyond uses BeyondMeat.com rather than Beyond.com.
