Retail / Consumer Packaged Goods (Food-Tech) · Deep dive

Medici Brands

Peter Rahal's post-RXBar house of better-for-you CPG brands — David Protein bars (28g protein, 150 calories, 0g sugar), a 30g-protein frozen dessert that sold out in 28 minutes on launch, and the newly launched HallPass 70-calorie candy line at Walmart — sitting on the proprietary EPG plant-fat platform Medici bought outright in May 2025 and now producing sales pace of ~US $300M in year two, valued at US $2.25B on a US $250M Series B co-led by Greenoaks and Valor on September 2 2026.

emerging

The question that decides it: Does a house-of-brands consumer packaged-goods holdco anchored on one patented plant-fat ingredient (EPG) compound faster than Simply Good Foods, Mars, Mondelez and Hershey can copy the format, launch me-too SKUs on their own private-label rails, litigate away EPG's exclusivity, or acquire Medici outright — before the class-action calorie-labeling case, the antitrust suit from cut-off EPG customers, or an FDA re-examination of the GRAS petition turns the ingredient into a liability rather than a moat?

My take ★★ Very interesting ★ Interesting − Maybe ✗ Not interesting

Snapshot

Medici Brands is Peter Rahal’s second act. After bootstrapping RXBar to a US $600M sale to Kellogg’s in 2017 and sitting out a five-year non-compete, he launched David Protein DTC on September 16 2024 with one product — a 28g-protein / 150-calorie / 0g-sugar bar built around Epogee’s proprietary EPG plant fat. David hit ~US $100M ARR by the May 2025 Series A, tracks to ~US $300M in 2026, and rolled into frozen dessert pints (June 2 2026, sold out in 28 minutes; Target nationwide July 28 2026) and HallPass 70-calorie candy at Walmart (August 30 2026). On September 2 2026 Medici closed a US $250M Series B at US $2.25B co-led by Greenoaks and Valor with ICONIQ, Imaginary Ventures and Rahal himself (US $20M). The core moat is control of EPG, which lets David advertise “150 calories” against competitors who can only match 220-260 — a moat being challenged by three cut-off EPG customers and a class-action alleging mislabeled calories and fat.

Founding story

Rahal is the son of Lebanese immigrants who ran a Chicago food-ingredients importer. He and childhood friend Jared Smith incorporated RXBar in 2013 on ~US $10,000, sold door-to-door to CrossFit gyms, and by October 2017 sold to Kellogg’s for US $600M all-cash — Rahal’s 50% share ~US $300M pretax (Inc, April 2018). He stayed CEO until 2019, admitted publicly he wasn’t thriving inside big-food, and stepped back to angel investing (early Olipop check, 2018). His Kellogg’s non-compete expired October 2022; he assembled Medici in 2023 with Zach Ranen (RAIZE), launched David on September 16 2024, and put US $6M of his own cash into the US $10M seed. Peter Attia signed on as CSO, Huberman as investor. Michael Tierney (Mikey’s, Stuffed Puffs) joined November 2024 to build HallPass. The strategic reveal: Medici is not a bar company but a holdco built to own the alt-fat platform — the Greenoaks-led Series A in May 2025 was used in part to acquire Epogee outright and wind down external customer orders (Food Business News, June 2025).

How it works

The product is engineered around one ingredient: EPG (esterified propoxylated glycerol), a rapeseed-derived plant oil chemically restructured so it passes through the human gut largely undigested. Epogee holds FDA GRAS “no questions” letters in 14 food categories — confectionery, plant-based protein, baked goods, frozen desserts and snack foods (Epogee, 2020-2024). EPG delivers ~0.7 kcal/g versus ~9 kcal/g for conventional fat. That gap is the entire product story: a formulator normally trades protein-isolate content against palatability, and EPG lets David load 28g protein and hold calories at 150 by substituting for the coconut or palm-kernel fat every competitor uses. Frozen dessert works the same way: 30g protein at 210-260 kcal per 16oz pint vs Ben & Jerry’s 1,000+. Manufacturing runs on a co-packer footprint (Medici owns no filling lines) with Epogee’s Indiana facility producing EPG; distribution runs through DSD and retail brokers into Walmart, Target, Costco, Wegmans and Kroger — 35,000+ doors as of the September 2 2026 raise.

Product and business overview

Three brands. David Protein — flagship bars (~10 SKUs by September 2026) at 28g protein / 150 kcal / 0g sugar, US $39 per 12-pack on Amazon (US $3.25/bar) versus ~US $2.20 for Quest and US $2.50 for Barebells; frozen dessert pints at 30g protein and 210-260 kcal per 16oz; RTD shakes rolling through 2026. HallPass — low-calorie confectionery, launched at Walmart August 30 2026 with three SKUs at 70 kcal and 1g sugar, priced against Reese’s, Kit Kat and M&Ms without a wellness premium. Rowdy — pipeline brand referenced by Rahal; no details public. Epogee subsidiary — the IP layer; produces EPG for internal formulations; as of May 2025 no longer sells externally.

Business model and pricing

Straight CPG gross margin. Amazon 12-pack list of US $39 implies US $3.25/bar; industry COGS on a formulated high-protein bar is ~US $0.75-1.10, so gross margin sits in the 55-70% range before slotting, marketing and distributor cuts. HallPass at a Walmart price under US $2 per pack runs tighter — commodity confectionery gross margin is 35-45%, and Medici will need volume plus EPG cost leverage to make the math work against Mars and Hershey. Series B use of proceeds: marketing to keep Simply Good and Vitamin Well from re-taking mindshare, contract-manufacturing capacity to reduce out-of-stocks, international expansion, and two-to-three more holdco brands.

Traction over time

Sacra pegs David as one of the fastest-scaling CPG launches on record; Rahal told AgFunder News in June 2026 he was targeting US $300M for the full year.

Market analysis

Global protein-bar market: ~US $5.3B in 2025 rising to ~US $8.25B by 2032 (Maximize Market Research, 2025). US high-protein snacking is the fastest-growing slice, pulled by two forces: the GLP-1 tailwind (~10M Americans on Ozempic/Wegovy/Zepbound in 2026, projected 30M+ by 2030 — PwC / Marketintelo — all needing dense-protein low-volume calories; Target expanded planograms early 2026 specifically for GLP-1-friendly protein SKUs — Fox Business), and the mainstreaming of Attia / Huberman-style protein-loading advice (~1g/lb/day). Confectionery (HallPass’s market) is US $50B+ in the US, dominated by Mars, Hershey, Mondelez, Ferrero. The better-for-you sub-segment has never produced a durable independent — Lily’s sold to Hershey in 2021 for ~US $425M. That is the precedent: someone builds a challenger fast, a major buys it before scale becomes prohibitive.

Competitive intel

Simply Good Foods (Quest, Atkins, OWYN) is the direct incumbent — Quest grew only ~2% in FY2025 vs a mid-teens category (Q4 2025 earnings), exactly the share David is taking. Vitamin Well / Barebells is the volume competitor on Walmart and Amazon — 20g protein, ~US $26-32/12-pack vs David’s US $39, EU manufacturing scale David lacks. Mars owns KIND (US $5B, 2020) and Nature’s Bakery, is the HallPass defender and Medici’s most obvious acquirer. Hershey consolidates better-for-you (Lily’s 2021, ONE Bar 2018, Fulfil 2023). Mondelez owns Clif Bar (2022, US $2.9B). Chomps, Legendary Foods, Built Bar, Perfect Snacks, Skinny Dipped, Unreal all fight the same shelf tiles. The three EPG plaintiffs — Own Your Hunger, Lighten Up Foods, Defiant Foods — lost the preliminary injunction (September 2025) but the antitrust suit is live (AgFunder News, January 2026); if a court eventually forces Medici to re-supply externally, the moat compresses.

History and evolution

• October 2017 — Kellogg’s acquires RXBar for US $600M all-cash; Rahal’s pretax share ~US $300M.
• March 2019 — Rahal steps back to non-executive inside Kellogg’s / Insurgent Brands.
• October 2022 — Non-compete expires.
• 2023 — Rahal incorporates what becomes Medici; recruits Zach Ranen.
• August/September 2024 — US $10M seed; Peter Attia joins as CSO; David launches DTC September 16.
• November 2024 — Michael Tierney joins to build HallPass.
• May 29 2025 — US $75M Series A led by Greenoaks; Medici acquires Epogee.
• June 2025 — Three EPG customers sue for antitrust; Epogee stops external orders.
• September 2025 — Court denies plaintiffs’ preliminary injunction.
• January 2026 — Class-action alleging mislabeled calories/fat filed and later dropped.
• June 2 2026 — David Frozen Dessert launches DTC; sells out in 28 minutes.
• July 28 2026 — Frozen dessert at Target nationwide.
• August 30 2026 — HallPass launches at Walmart nationwide.
• September 2 2026 — US $250M Series B closes at US $2.25B.

What people say

The case for

Rahal’s track record leads every pitch — RXBar was one of the cleanest CPG exits of the 2010s (bootstrapped, no VC dilution, US $600M cash) and a founder doing it twice is rare. Attia (CSO) and Huberman give the science story a credibility layer competitors don’t have; “the most protein-dense bar in existence” replaces RXBar’s “just three ingredients” (Forbes, December 2024). Distribution is real — 35,000+ doors in year two is faster than RXBar, Quest or Barebells’s US entry (Nosh Notables 2024). The frozen 28-minute sell-out and Target nationwide in seven weeks are what let Greenoaks and Valor triple the mark on a 15-month gap. Inc, Forbes, Athletech News and Fitt Insider have run extended positive coverage since December 2024.

The complaints

Taste is polarizing: Trustpilot mixed, one widely-quoted critic called Cookie Dough “powdered dog poo” (Grocery Edit, 2025), and Reddit flags chalky texture and artificial aftertaste. The January 2026 class-action alleged lab tests showed bars with up to 400% more fat and 80% more calories than labeled; plaintiffs dropped it but not before it circulated, and Rahal’s rebuttal (“EPG passes through undigested”) opened the durability-of-GRAS question. The antitrust suit from the three cut-off EPG customers is more strategically dangerous — Modern Retail called it a case “threatening to tear the CPG world apart” (2025). Justin Mares and other CPG operators have publicly questioned whether EPG-heavy formulation could correlate with effects like hair loss (Justin Mares Substack, 2025) — anecdotal, unproven, but real Twitter noise. Structurally, Sacra and Snaxshot both flag single-ingredient dependency: a Medici built on EPG is built on one FDA no-questions letter and one Indiana plant.

Outlook: the open question

The answer-conditions are unusually crisp for a CPG. Medici works if three things hold through 2027-2028. First, EPG exclusivity survives — the antitrust suit stays lost on appeal, no competitor commercializes a comparable alt-fat, and the FDA does not re-open the GRAS petitions off the calorie-labeling controversy. Second, David’s growth does not roll over as Simply Good and Vitamin Well pour trade dollars into shelf-defense — plausible attacks from Quest, Barebells, KIND or a Kirkland private-label knockoff (Costco has done this to Chomps and Quest already). Third, HallPass and Rowdy land at David-like unit economics rather than commodity confectionery margins. If all three hold, Medici compounds into a differentiated CPG holdco that IPOs at US $5-10B or sells to Mars, Hershey, Mondelez or PepsiCo. If any one breaks, Medici is a single-brand phenomenon trading at 3-5x revenue, not the ~7-8x the Series B mark implies. The metric to watch: whether David revenue crosses US $500M in 2027 with EPG exclusivity still legally intact and gross margin above 55%. If yes, generational CPG. If not, a very well-funded Quest 2.0.

How to attack it

The specific wedge: launch a high-protein bar built on a different alt-fat or high-solubility fibre matrix that legally cannot be litigated away, priced ~30% under David. David’s caloric-density advantage rests entirely on EPG, which Medici owns exclusively. But the underlying physics — deliver mouthfeel without absorbable calories — is not unique to EPG: resistant starches, allulose, novel soluble fibres, restructured starch-fat matrices and next-generation fat esters are all commercializable within 18-24 months by a well-funded startup with a food-scientist team and one FDA GRAS petition. An attacker launching at 30g protein / 180 kcal / US $2.40 per bar (against David’s 28g / 150 / US $3.25) undercuts on price while conceding only 30 calories on the label. The three EPG-plaintiff brands are pre-qualified acquisition targets for anyone who wants a running start.

Weaknesses: (1) Single-ingredient dependency — one FDA re-examination or one Indiana plant disruption takes the David and HallPass P&L offline. (2) Legal overhang — the antitrust suit and dropped class-action created a public record competitors can weaponize in trade (“David’s label is under investigation” is a real Walmart-buyer conversation). (3) Taste — Reddit and Trustpilot both confirm polarizing texture/aftertaste; an EPG-alternative bar that just tastes better takes the format war. (4) Price ceiling — US $3.25/bar is 40-50% above Barebells and Quest; Kirkland Signature can hit US $1.80 tomorrow. (5) Channel concentration — Walmart, Target and Costco control >60% of David’s volume and each has weaponized private label against challengers before. (6) Execution ceiling — RXBar was one SKU; a three-brand holdco plus a manufacturing subsidiary is an order of magnitude harder, and Rahal himself told Inc in 2018 he did not thrive at scale under Kellogg’s.

Adjacent-segment play

The Medici stack — one proprietary alt-fat, a marketing engine that takes a SKU from zero to Walmart nationwide inside twelve months, and a founder-CEO with celebrity science advisors — is repackageable four ways. Medical nutrition: EPG’s density story is even more valuable to patients who must gain weight on small volumes (oncology, CF, geriatric), where Abbott’s Ensure and Nestlé Health Science run decade-old formulations. GLP-1-companion nutrition: the 30M Americans projected on GLP-1s by 2030 need muscle-sparing dense-protein feeding; a branded GLP-1 line sold via Ro, Hims and telehealth is a channel Medici can enter without cannibalizing David. Premium dog treats: EPG transposes cleanly to the US premium-pet-treat category dominated by Mars, General Mills and Nestlé Purina; no independent Rahal-style challenger yet. International: Medici is US-only through September 2026; Asia-Pacific offers better ROI than Europe, where Vitamin Well is incumbent. What likely does not work is restaurant / food-service — EPG’s GRAS letters don’t cover every prep method, and the operational complexity is a poor match for Medici’s lean holdco.

Sources and further reading

• Medici Brands Raises $250 Million in Series B Funding (PRNewswire, September 2 2026)
• David Protein Parent Lands $250M to Build a Better-for-You Food Empire (Athletech News, September 2 2026)
• David Protein Maker Valued at $2.25 Billion in New Funding Deal (Business of Fashion, September 2 2026)
• Exclusive: David Protein scales alt-fat EPG capacity, eyes CPG deals as CEO targets $300m revenues in 2026 (AgFunder News, June 2026)
• HallPass Launches Nationwide at Walmart With 70-Calorie Candy (PRNewswire, August 30 2026)
• David Closes $75 Million Series A Funding Round (BusinessWire, May 29 2025)
• David Protein’s acquisition of Epogee and a subsequent lawsuit are threatening to tear the CPG world apart (Modern Retail, 2025)
• David Protein scores initial victory in antitrust case over EPG fat replacer; plaintiffs say battle isn’t over (AgFunder News, September 2025)
• He Started His Company for $10,000. He Sold It for $600 Million Five Years Later (Inc, April 2018)
• This Protein Bar Cofounder Sold His Company For $600 Million. Now He Wants Another Bite Of The Market. (Forbes, December 2024)
• Inside David Protein’s Playful and Provocative Billion-Dollar Playbook (Inc, February 2026)