The preprint of our manuscript is online. We show how to produce bioactive mature VEGF-C in the cytoplasm of E. coli bacteria without the need for a folding step. It took us quite a while to get there, and we tried many things that did not work before we found a way how to do it. We describe also the methods that failed. It looks as if VEGF-C has simply too many cysteine residues that all have to pair up in the correct configuration. In the same manuscript, we also report a workable refolding method. Please have a look and give us some feedback: https://www.researchsquare.com/article/rs-1776636/v1.