Today I’m interviewing Aparna Venkatesh, the Collaborative Innovation lead for Southeast Asia and Oceana at Buhler where she leads collaboration on innovation strategy in emerging opportunities for sustainable foods and novel food technology applications
For those that don’t know, Buhler is a swiss multinational business-to-business giant. Though they do a ton of things, if you’ve worked in the food industry, you would know that they do a lot of process equipment. Arpana goes into a lot more detail the many industries that Buhler innovates in, and properly educates me on the origins and capabilities this company has.
Aparna also has had a decade of experience working for the Singaporean government and was one of the scientists that began the process of approving cultivated meat in Singapore.
So we deep dive into the technological advancements in both cultivated and plant-based meat and we discuss just how important a proactive government is when it comes to pushing this technology. We also discuss how companies can invest in long-term innovation, especially with the help of Buhler.
What’s up with Adam
Ok, so I’m in Taiwan. It’s kinda gloomy. It reminds me of pretty much all of the countries I’ve visited smashed together though it’s actually the first place I’ve been to in this trip that speaks Chinese. Doesn’t help me though!
One of the highlights of my trip to Japan is actually meeting with an old high school friend. 8 years ago, he decided to join the military and has bounced around the world. When I met him, he settled down with his wife in Okinawa living a peaceful life with his 3 cats and a slew of plants.
It kind of makes me think, where am I with my life?
Existential crisis aside, I have a lineup of really interesting people to talk to in Taiwan, and also after October, I’m going back to California.
Lots of reasons why I’m deciding to go back now, but the biggest one is that I do truly miss my friends and most importantly, I do truly miss, working on something bigger than myself. Though this trip has probably changed my life, and I’m so glad I did it, I just can’t help but be excited about working again.
Alright, before we get into this interview, let’s talk about some recent news. Beyond Meat seems to be this poster child of bad news for the past couple of months from a failed Mcdonald’s launch to their leadership assaulting someone.
Another crack to the face is a 200-person reduction of force, about 20%, (where initially they let go 5% of their staff 2 months ago. Other plant-based brands are feeling it such as Impossible laying off 6% of its force and Planterra laying off 120ish people.
Ok let’s look at the other layoffs, HelloFresh is laying off 600 people, Oracle, that software company, is laying off 200 people, Intel and Surveymonkey are also laying off 11% of their staff.
So why am I including companies that aren’t food companies? To show that this is happening to everyone. Though Beyond Meat is getting the most spotlight, everyone is getting crushed with layoffs. Everyone is reducing their workforce.
The reason I’m mentioning this before our interview, is to one is to show a wider lens of what’s happening to the world. People are cutting out the excess of their companies that just might not be working on the macro economic scale. Two, mania is dying down. When mania dies down, we get a little more clarity on the steps toward the innovation ahead.
Generally, this brings not only more thoughtful funding but also brings out another type of innovation that’s much needed during hard times: scrappiness.
I hope you enjoy this interview with Arpana, we do this at the Buhler office in Singapore
Links
Buhler does Consumer Foods, Animal Feed, Advanced Materials
Larve Processing
Located in Utzville
Tech Scout
Big Idea Ventures
Astar – Largest public research agency in Singapore
Andrew Noyes
JUST/GOOD Meat
Singapore Food Agency
Planted uses this technology
Australia and Korea have the biggest number of interest in alternative proteins
Protein Innovation Center in Singapore
Arpana’s LinkedIn
End of Show
I wrote a small piece about Momofuku Ando, the inventor of the cup of noodles. (you can read more about it on our website myfoodjobrocks.com) and I found it very inspiring. In Japan, I went to the Nissin’s Cup of Noodle Museum and enjoyed learning about this 48-year-old man who went to jail, had a business venture fail, and believed in an idea to feed the world.
Not only that, but the museum explained his thought process, his innovation, and the risks he took to adapt to the current technologies to make Nissin the dominant ramen noodle company.
When we look at the present, we can be concerned that what we innovate is a money pit, but when we study past innovations, we can gather a little insight that what they did was just as hard. Instant Ramen used to be a premium product. Selling for 3 to 5 times as much as regular soba noodles but over time and constant persistence, the instant ramen we all know and love feeds poor college students and entrepreneurs.
It takes time to innovate. Years to be competitively viable and persistence to make it ubiquitous. When considering going forth into the unknown with new technology, the past can tell us the possibilities if we keep on going