Simplot Australia has backed the food tech ideas of eight new businesses with funding and detailed mentoring programs.
Five Australian start-up and three scale-up businesses will have the opportunity to turn their ideas into profitable products and services following successful pitches earlier this month.
Organised in partnership with Slingshot, which develops and manages corporate accelerator programs, Simplot Ignite attracted 87 applicants.
Of those, 30 were invited to personally pitch their ideas.
The eight successful applicants presented business ideas that addressed key food imperatives including food solutions for healthy ageing, convenience in food, nutrigenomics, and personalised nutrition.
“Many of the successful applicants were able to demonstrate a unique idea that was aligned with our business strategy, as well as solving a significant unmet market need,” said Simplot Australia chief marketing and digital officer Fiona Allen.
“The overall calibre of the ideas was outstanding and is a strong indicator of the level of innovation and disruption which is going to occur within the food industry over the next few years.”
Each of the five start-up winners will receive $30,000 seed-funding, and participation in an intensive 12-week accelerator program to build and develop their idea.
The three scale-up winners will be able to access relevant Simplot resources, mentoring and coaching by some of the industry’s leading experts and have access to products and services provided by Slingshot’s strategic partners and sponsors.
All eight Simplot Ignite participants will also have the opportunity to present their concept to investors, and there is potential for a commercial agreement with Simplot Australia.
The five start-up winners are as follows.
ChewsR is an app which uses appealing food images instead of a written menu to help consumers decide what to eat. The winning team from Chewsr described the app as ‘the food baby of Tinder and Uber’. Danny Burrito is a clever idea built around a share economy concept to utilise existing but idle commercial kitchen resources. Athletes Gift is based on an individual’s nutritional and function needs (stamina, recovery and strength). It has the potential to deliver the benefits of hyper-personalised, DNA-based nutritional eating – essentially 'food as medicine'. The Virtual Nutrition Clinic aims to reduce the time, cost and location barriers for people wanting to access personalised expert nutrition. Simplot says it could be game-changing for the weight-loss and wellbeing industry. Dubbed ‘food with benefits’, Yummed.com is a social networking platform based around shared dining experiences. It could be the RSVP of dining experiences.
The three scale-up winners are as follows.
Hum Technologies targets the food service industry to streamline and build efficiency for the 80,000 small businesses operating in the Australian food sector. It delivers synergy with Simplot’s existing food service business and helps streamline these processes to save business managers hours of time and improve profitability. Low Carb (and carb intolerance) is the new-gluten free, and the Low Carb Living Group range taps into the rising consumer demand for low-carb and sugar-free products. Yello is described as the ‘uber’ for food home delivery and is already changing the way food is delivered by providing an on-demand delivery market.
