THE HI-TECH, HARD-WORKING geeks of Silicon Valley have found a way to avoid the pesky and time-consuming business of eating, and investors are pouring in.

Instead of breakfast and lunch, the busy workers swig protein powders with names like Soylent, Schmoylent and Schmilk.

“It just removes food completely from my morning equation up until about 7 p.m.,” says a delighted Aaron Melocik, 34, a San Francisco software developer.

Says the New York Times of this disturbing trend: “While athletes and dieters have been drinking their dinner for years, Silicon Valley’s workers are now increasingly chugging their meals, too, so they can more quickly get back to their computer work.”

It appears that venture capitalists are keen on this new manifestation of the old brutal “lunch is for wimps” idea. Investor Alexis Ohanian, a Reddit co-founder, says: “My dream in an ideal scenario would be if I could just pick up some at the airport, pre-made in the refrigerator section.” He has put his money where his mouth is and invested in Soylent.

The company is the brainchild of software engineer Rob Rhinehart, who was working long hours and eating badly. So decided to create a food product for hard workers like himself for whom even eating a sandwich at the desk took too much time away from coding. He gained more than $3 million in funding from the crowdsourcing site Tilt.

Mr Rhinehart told the New York Times that his company was shipping “at the kiloton scale” each quarter and had attracted $24.5 million in financing. Soylent’s blurb says: “Soylent is a simple, healthy, and affordable drink designed to efficiently serve your staple food needs.”

Oh brave new world, that has such terrible things in it!

ENDS