November 8, 2019 — At Fish 2.0’s Global Innovators Forum, the top innovators in six categories spanned the seafood industry, from packaging materials to blockchain.
Among the featured creations this year were: A fish transport box that replaces polystyrene containers; a barley-based fish feed; an antibiotic-free crayfish hatchery; a robotic fish outfitted with sensors to monitor offshore fish farms; an online B2B wholesale marketplace; and a blockchain-based traceability solution.
April 25, 2019 — It’s not hard to find seafood here in the Cape Fear, but where does our local seafood industry stand in terms of sustainability?
“We have a lot of new growers,” Seaview Crab Company Co-owner Sam Romano said. “It’s an exciting time to grow oysters in North Carolina.”
As the demand goes up, supply tends to go down. Entrepreneurs like Romano are trying to change that with the help of Fish 2.0.
“Our seafood production in North Carolina has actually been going down for a variety of reasons,” Romano said. “But shellfish is something that’s new and up and coming.”
Entrepreneurs came out to a two-day workshop hosted by UNCW and Fish 2.0. At the workshop they pitched business proposals and new technology for the fishing industry.
March 15, 2019 — Land-based aquaculture can sound like a mirage — shrimp farms in the desert, salmon swimming “upstream” in an alpine village tank, tilapia swishing over the plains. And for a long time, ample production of sea delicacies in recirculating aquaculture systems (RAS) has been more dream than reality. Yet the technology and its innovators steadily have gained momentum and finally may be hitting their tipping point.
The allure of fish grown on land is easy to understand: Like all aquaculture, it reduces demand for wild fish, but unlike with sea-based pens, closed-loop RAS farms (PDF) run no risk of fish escaping to dilute the native gene pool, spread diseases or discharge waste and antibiotics into the wild. RAS farmers have near-full control over growing conditions, so they can optimize for growth and quality. And with its amenability to unlikely locations, RAS can sit near major consumer markets, providing fresh local seafood even when the shore is hundreds of miles away.
So why aren’t we eating it already? RAS entrepreneurs face three big challenges: energy; contamination risks; and money. Mimicking a natural system within strictly regulated parameters is an energy-intensive endeavor, and sustainability (not to mention costs) demands locating RAS facilities next to cheap, abundant energy sources. A pathogen let loose in a closed system can be a disaster, so RAS farmers have to be extra scrupulous about avoiding contamination.
Money may be the biggest hurdle: RAS operations need high volumes and relatively long ramp-ups to reach profitability, and the pile of patient capital needed to build and grow large, high-tech facilities can be as elusive as Moby Dick.
January 25, 2018 — In a large ballroom at Stanford University’s Arrillaga Alumni Center, jittery entrepreneurs make their way onto a small stage to pitch their sustainable seafood ventures. Out of 184 applications, only 40 have made the cut. Among the finalists are a mail-order oyster startup that will ship the food overnight to your door, a manufacturer of devices that track lost fishing gear, an Alaskan processing facility looking to expand, and training programs that teach Peruvian fishermen how to operate more sustainably.
They’re taking part in the third bi-annual Fish 2.0 competition, and the stakes are high. Many of these entrepreneurs have never made a pitch in front of an audience before. And with some of the largest and most respected investors in the sector, including Rabobank, Aqua-Spark, and Obvious Ventures, eagerly looking on, competitors are anxious to make a good impression. Flanked by projectors and armed only with a microphone and a remote to advance their slides, entrepreneurs from as far away as Italy, Peru, and the Solomon Islands have only a few minutes to make their pitch in front of a four-judge panel and a room full of potentially lucrative connections.
With global demand for sustainable seafood growing rapidly, the industry hasn’t been able to keep pace. Programs like Fish 2.0 hope to meet that demand and support the sector’s growth by connecting investors to emerging businesses. Similar to accelerators like Mixing Bowl, Imagine H2O, and the Chobani Incubator, Fish 2.0 aims to strengthen the sustainable seafood movement by helping ventures become financially sustainable, scalable, and profitable.
Although Fish 2.0 is framed as a competition, networking is what really matters for most participants. The eight competition winners each receive $5,000 in prize money, but for past winner Norah Eddy, whose company Salty Girl Seafood sells sustainable fish in ready-to-cook, pre-marinated packages, the experience and exposure were more important than the actual cash. Eddy says the connections she fostered at Fish 2.0 two years ago have remained fruitful for Salty Girl, which has expanded its line of products since they won a prize at the competition.
“We’ve subsequently raised money and our connection to Fish 2.0 has only served us well in business following the competition,” Eddy adds.
A Forum for Changemakers
Fish 2.0 is the brainchild of Monica Jain, a Wharton MBA graduate and former marine biologist, and it brings her two passions together. “There are a lot of great companies starting up and they need capital to grow effectively,” she says. “It’s the same in every field. We can’t expect innovative business to grow without capital.”
Funded by academic institutions, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, USAID, the U.S. State Department, investment funds, and others, the Fish 2.0 process starts a year before the actual event, with businesses applying to the competition online. Each applicant is put through a series of assessments that examine their business plans, potential for impact, risks, and opportunities for investment. While some businesses are well-established and looking to expand, others are looking for their initial seed money.
No matter the size of their business, each of the top 40 entrepreneurs is paired with an impact advisor and an investment advisor who offer feedback on both the science and the business sense of their model. The contestants span the broad and diverse seafood supply chain, with offerings ranging from an oyster co-op in Florida looking for investors to help fund construction of a hatchery, to Seafood IQ, an Icelandic company that uses radio frequency identification (RFID) labels so consumers can be sure they know where their fish is coming from.
Seafood provides a unique challenge because the industry is global, fractured, and full of middlemen. Salmon, for example, may be caught in Alaska, processed in China, and then shipped back to the U.S. for sale. As with other meats, it’s often difficult to tell where seafood is coming from or whether it’s sustainable. And the problem is getting more pronounced as global demand increases. In 2016, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) found that global per capita fish consumption had hit more than 44 pounds a year, an all-time high.
Earlier this year the World Bank reported that, “about 90 percent of marine fisheries monitored by the FAO are fully fished or overfished, up from about 75 percent in 2005.” In addition to increased consumption, the report also points to the fact that “fish stocks are also under pressure from pollution, coastal development, and the impacts of climate change.”
Rather than focusing on improving consumer education or tightening governmental regulations, Fish 2.0 hopes to protect the oceans by showing sustainability makes good business sense. Because the seafood industry relies on natural resources, Jain believes that sustainable ventures, which are able to preserve those resources for years to come, are more “likely to do better in the long run.” Sustainable, she says, is simply “better business.”
Tim Fitzgerald of the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF)—and a judge at this year’s Fish 2.0 contest—agrees that this investment is vital to the long-term health of the oceans. “To have large-scale change, you have to engage business,” he says.
Read the full story at Civil Eats
December 13, 2017 — CARMEL, Calif. — The following was released by Fish 2.0:
Fish 2.0 today announced the winners of its 11 ICX (Industry Connection) prizes, the final awards in the Fish 2.0 2017 competition for sustainable seafood businesses.
The competition’s cash prize winners were announced Nov. 8 at the close of the Fish 2.0 2017 Innovation Forum at Stanford University. Those awards went to the eight seafood ventures—one in each of the competition’s six regional and two global tracks—that earned the highest scores from investor-judges.
All of the 39 finalists from around the world who presented at the Forum were eligible for ICX prizes. These prizes are unique opportunities for ventures to gain market insights and expertise from industry leaders who support growth and innovation in sustainable seafood. Offered by investors and buyers, intermediaries and other seafood companies, ICX prizes include invitations to work directly with industry leaders on investment structures and growth plans or developing branding and market penetration strategies; to attend investor and industry events; and to meet and present to retail and wholesale partners in Europe and the U.S.
“It’s important for us to support the growth of the sustainable seafood sector as well as innovations in this sector,” said Guy Dean, vice president and chief sustainability officer at Albion Farms & Fisheries. “Fish 2.0 does just that, and their results have been fabulous. As a successful protein company, we are happy to help coach and mentor entrepreneurs because they will ultimately create positive impact for our industry and for future generations. In addition, this is a great opportunity for us to learn about new initiatives. In fact, we gain as much value in learning about the prize recipient’s innovation as we hope the prize recipient gains from our input and work with them.”
ICX prize recipients were chosen based on fit with the prize criteria and ability to take full advantage of the prize.
“Given Alltech’s ACE principle commitment to agricultural solutions that benefit the animal, consumer and environment, and to improving aquafeed specifically, we were eager to partner with Fish 2.0 in identifying companies that might be able to complement our core competencies and capabilities,” said Dr. Sasha Tozzi, algae technical manager at Alltech. “We are very excited to meet NovoNutrients to learn more about their technology, which could have many applications in Alltech’s animal nutrition. ShellBond’s capability to use swine waste as a source of a natural carotenoid antioxidant is another compelling match.”
Here is the full list of ICX prizes and winners, by prize sponsor:
Albion Farms & Fisheries
Prize: A full day of expert consultation with the Albion Farms & Fisheries senior leadership team and CSO, including advice and insight on opening new market opportunities and business growth strategies.
Winner: Fish Extend of Santiago, Chile, whose product extends the shelf life of fresh fish using natural ingredients, reducing production losses due to spoilage.
Alltech
Prize: Two passes for ONE: the Alltech Ideas Conference in Lexington, Kentucky, in 2018, and private meetings in Lexington with members of the Alltech team.
Winners: NovoNutrients of Sunnyvale, California (also the competition’s Supply Chain Innovation track winner), which is using food-grade bacteria to make fish food from industrial carbon emissions; and
ShellBond of Wilmington, North Carolina, whose technology solves problems in oyster habitat restoration, spat sedimentation, oil cleanup and nonorganic antioxidants in salmon farms.
Australis Aquaculture
Prize: One-day consultation with the Australis CEO and leadership team on how to introduce new products to market and/or scale an aquaculture enterprise.
Winner:VakSea of Baltimore, which has developed a patented oral vaccine delivered via fish feed that promotes healthier fish and decreases antibiotic use in aquaculture.
Calvert Impact Capital (formerly Calvert Foundation)
Prize: Half-day expert consultation with Calvert Impact Capital lending staff who lead its Women Investing in Women program, including mentorship, guidance and information on accessing financing.
Winner: American Unagi of Thomaston, Maine (the competition’s short-pitch winner), which grows locally harvested glass eels to market size in a land-based aquaculture system.
FishChoice
Prize: Two half-day meetings or one full-day meeting for up to three people with the FishChoice leadership team, who will share FishChoice’s expertise on sustainable seafood ratings and certifications.
Winner: Fair Agora of Bangkok, whose Verifik8 monitoring and verification software collects data from fish farms and cooperatives to help seafood buyers make safe and responsible choices.
IntraFish
Prize: Two tickets to the IntraFish Seafood Investor Forum in either New York or London.
Winners: ColomboSky of Verona, Italy, whose Aqua-X technology for the marine aquaculture industry uses satellite images, in-situ data and expert supervision to monitor and forecast water quality; and
TunaSolutions of Sydney, a fair-trade online marketplace for the tuna industry that connect fishers with buyers and facilitates real-time trading through a series of online auctions.
Rabobank International
Prize: Half-day meeting and consultation with the Rabobank North American seafood lending team, and a consultation with Rabobank’s global seafood analyst.
Winner: SmartCatch of Palo Alto, California, whose flagship product is DigiCatch, a remotely controllable video, lighting and oceanographic catch monitoring system.
RSF Social Finance
Prize: One-day visit to the RSF Social Finance offices for coaching sessions with the social enterprise lending team and the RSF marketing team.
Winner: Real Oyster Cult of Duxbury, Massachusetts (also the competition’s New England track winner), which ships fresh oysters from all over North America direct to consumers overnight.
Stavis Seafoods
Prize: Half-day consultation with the Stavis Seafoods CEO and responsible sourcing manager, including mentorship, guidance and information on accessing new market opportunities.
Winner: OneForNeptune of Santa Fe, New Mexico, which offers healthy, high-protein snack foods made from underutilized and undervalued U.S. groundfish species and industry offcuts.
TomAlgae
Prize: Two-day consultation with specialists from TomAlgae, who will offer advice and expertise on successfully scaling oyster aquaculture production.
Winners: Panacea Oysters of Spring Creek, Florida (also the competition’s South Atlantic and Gulf Coast Shellfish track winner), which is restoring oyster farming in Apalachicola Bay by creating a unified brand and guaranteeing purchases to farmers; and Pensacola Bay Oyster Company of Pensacola, Florida, an oyster farm producing premium oysters for the half-shell market, with the goal of restoring the Gulf Coast’s environment and working waterfronts.
Wabel
Prize: The Wabel Retail Prize includes an invitation to the Wabel Summit, at least eight meetings with fish buyers from Europe’s largest retail groups, and more.
Winner: Northline Seafoods of Sitka, Alaska (also the competition’s U.S. West Coast track winner), whose unique floating processing facility eliminates waste and extends the shelf life of sustainable wild salmon.
“Our team is thrilled to receive the Stavis Seafoods ICX prize,” said Nick Mendoza, CEO of OneForNeptune. “We’re introducing seafood products to a consumer market dominated by non-seafood meat snacks, which is both a challenge and an opportunity. Guidance from a company that is nearly 100 years old could be pivotal to our success, helping us to avoid the mistakes and pitfalls that can derail young companies. This prize gives us an invaluable opportunity to learn directly from Richard Stavis, a seafood innovator who has successfully grown a large company while continuing to focus attention on fishing communities, sustainable sourcing and enhancing consumer awareness.”
Fish 2.0 founder and executive director Monica Jain said the prizes and the spirit behind them exemplify what Fish 2.0 is all about—growing the sustainable seafood industry through connections and learning. “We’re grateful to these forward-thinking prize givers for offering their time and resources to these ventures and to the field,” she said. “Over the past years, these prizes and the partnerships that result from them have led to extraordinary growth acceleration for the winning ventures and the prize givers. These are golden opportunities.”
The prize givers benefit along with the entrepreneurs. “Participation in Fish 2.0 gives us fantastic insight into the sustainable seafood sector—it’s a great way to build our network and learn about the range of innovation and investment activity that’s happening to support sustainable oceans,” said Leigh Moran, senior officer, strategy, at Calvert Impact Capital. “Offering an ICX prize is a great way for CIC to be more involved in Fish 2.0 and continue learning about the sector.”
Fish 2.0 is a Carmel, California–based social enterprise that connects investors and entrepreneurs to grow the global sustainable seafood sector. Working through Fish 2.0’s expanding global network, regional workshops and other events, and online competition platform, Fish 2.0 participants collaborate to drive innovation, business growth and positive impact. Everyone benefits: Entrepreneurs meet potential investors, partners and advisors. Investors and advisors get early access to investment opportunities and learn about emerging technologies and trends. Industry leaders gain direct access to sustainable seafood suppliers and partners.
November 10, 2017 — Forget the romantic image of a lonely fisherman chasing his catch on the open water. Fishing supply chains have become sprawling, technology-driven operations rife with overfishing and human rights abuses.
For that reason, fishing companies and the stores that sell their products are increasingly on the hook for the environmental and human effects of their supply chains. The need to know where fish comes from for legal compliance purposes and resource preservation, from sea to shelf, has spawned “seatech.”
Monica Jain, founder of Fish 2.0, an organization that fosters entrepreneurship in sustainable fishing and aquaculture, describes this space as “new monitoring, visibility, production and processing tools for the seafood industry.”
One-third of global fishing stocks are depleted, according to the Greenpeace Sea of Distress report issued in October. And global fish catches have been declining since the 1990s. With seafood production expected to increase 20 percent by 2025, ocean ecosystems are being decimated. Furthermore, the U.S. State Department has found forced labor and human trafficking on fishing vessels or processing facilities in more than 50 countries.
In response, Greenpeace found that major food industry players including Sodexo, Aramark and Compass group are taking strides towards protecting the oceans and the people who make a living from them by selling responsibly-sourced seafood, and increasing transparency and better practices at sea.
Aramark, for example, is the first U.S. foodservice company to procure seafood from vessels that don’t participate in transshipment, policies that allow vessels to fish for years and can breed labor and human rights abuses. Also this year, global tuna giant Thai Union has taken the lead to source sustainably caught tuna and protect worker’s rights.
Read the full story at GreenBiz
November 8, 2017 — PALO ALTO, Calif. — The following was released by Fish 2.0:
Fish 2.0 closed out its 2017 Innovation Forum today by awarding cash prizes to the eight seafood ventures earning the highest scores in this year’s Fish 2.0 business competition. The winners are simplifying supply chains while increasing income for fishers and farmers, bringing to market creative approaches to aquaculture production and traceability, and getting consumers excited about seafood.
Diverse panels of investor-judges chose the cash prize winners from among 22 presenters who came out on top in six regional and two global tracks. Judges picked the strongest business in each track based on the presenters’ 3-minute pitches and 5-minute question-and-answer sessions on stage at Stanford University. The winners by track are:
Sustainable Fishery Trade (Chile and Peru), a Lima, Peru–based social enterprise that works with artisanal fishers to provide high-quality, traceable seafood direct to restaurants.
Real Oyster Cult (New England), a Duxbury, Massachusetts, business that ships fresh oysters from all over North America direct to consumers overnight.
Didds Fishing Company (Pacific Islands), a Solomon Islands social enterprise that enables island communities to fish for premium bottom-water species offshore, relieving pressure on in-shore fisheries.
EnerGaia (Southeast Asia), a Bangkok-based company that farms spirulina, an algae superfood, on urban rooftops and in rural communities for use in a variety of food products.
Panacea Oyster Co-Op (South Atlantic and Gulf Coast Shellfish) of Spring Creek, Florida, which is restoring oyster farming in Apalachicola Bay by creating a unified brand and guaranteeing purchases to farmers.
Northline Seafoods (U.S. West Coast), an Alaska-based company whose unique floating processing facility eliminates waste and extends the shelf life of sustainable wild salmon.
ThisFish (Transparency and Traceability) a Vancouver, B.C., company whose traceability software helps seafood enterprises around the world record key supply chain data and improve business efficiency.
NovoNutrients (Supply Chain Innovation) of Sunnyvale, California, which is using food-grade bacteria to make fish food from industrial carbon emissions.
“We’re elated that we won and also humbled—there are so many bright lights in the industry right now, and so much innovation going on,” said Eric Enno Tamm, CEO of ThisFish. “Many of those companies approached me about our technology. It’s helpful to connect with the early adopters.”
Saumil Shah, managing director of EnerGaia, and Simone Pisu, CEO of Sustainable Fishery Trade, also cited the value of connections—and welcomed the attention of the global marketplace.
“Being in a competition with such a strong presence in the U.S. market is going to be a real launching point for us,” said Shah. “We are making great connections not only with investors but also with partners and buyers.”
“The Fish 2.0 award gives us the possibility to have the spotlight of the sector on us,” said Pisu. “Our mission is to improve the fishery sector in the region. We now have more potential to inspire other companies.”
Prizes include $40,000 cash, ICX (Industry Connection) awards
Each winner received a $5,000 cash prize. They and all the other finalists are also eligible for ICX (Industry Connection) prizes: unique opportunities for ventures to gain market insights and expertise from industry leaders that support growth and innovation in sustainable seafood. The Fish 2.0 advisory panel will announce the winners of those prizes in December.
“I was impressed with the range of businesses and innovations,” said Leigh Moran, senior officer, strategy, at Calvert Impact Capital, which is sponsoring an ICX prize. “This was the strongest group yet at Fish 2.0; I noticed more focus on brand and more sophistication, combined with a commitment to building the sustainable seafood sector overall.”
Participating in Fish 2.0, she added, “is a great way for us to stay up to speed on what’s going on in the sector. It’s an entirely unique event in terms of the different actors it brings together, the topics it addresses, and the focus on both good impact and good business.”
Audience chooses favorites in short-pitch session
The 17 remaining finalists delivered 90-second pitches directly to the audience of about 250 investors, business leaders and government representatives, who voted for the company they most wanted to follow up with. The top vote-getter was American Unagi, a Thomaston, Maine, company that grows locally harvested glass eels to market size in a land-based aquaculture system, providing a sustainable eel option for the domestic market while creating economic opportunity in a rural area.
The 39 companies presenting at the finals emerged with top scores from an initial field of 184 and prevailed in a particularly strong semifinalist field of 80 ventures. During Fish 2.0’s seven-month competition program, which took place online up to the finals, businesses received feedback from investor-judges and worked with business and impact advisors to develop their strategies, integrate positive impacts and metrics into their plans, and position their enterprise for investment. At least six judges scored each competitor that reached the finals.
“The power of this event is seeing a lot of different companies approaching similar problems with a variety of technologies,” said Dan Pullman of Fresh Source Capital, a judge on two panels. “I can compare their presentations, talk to them and get to know them. I’m impressed—the entrepreneurs are very well prepared. They are ready to be communicating to investors.”
Five global trends are driving innovation
Leading up to the Innovation Forum, Fish 2.0 analyzed the market demands that companies in the Fish 2.0 network are responding to and found that five accelerating global trends are driving transformation in the seafood industry: the need to predict and understand climate change impacts; wild fish stocks nearing maximum yield; product globalization and the rise of online sales; the worldwide growth of a health-conscious middle class; and aquaculture’s rapid expansion. These five trends are opening up new markets in the seafood sector, and ventures around the world are racing to capture a share of the opportunities.
“Innovation in the seafood sector is growing like never before,” said Fish 2.0 founder and executive director Monica Jain. “Rapid technology advances and new players are coming to this previously traditional sector. We’re seeing creative products, services and business models that solve problems and remove barriers to both sustainability and growth of the seafood supply. These innovations are poised to create significant changes in the way seafood is produced, harvested and marketed over the next decade.”
Learn more about Fish 2.0 by visiting their site here.
September 26, 2017 — Fish 2.0, a business competition that connects seafood businesses and investors to grow the sustainable seafood sector, announced last week that 40 companies in the seafood industry will present ideas to investors at the Fish 2.0 Innovation Forum taking place in November at Stanford University in California.
The program bears similarities to the hit television show Shark Tank, and the field of contestants was narrowed from a long list of 184 entrants.
“This is the strongest group ever. The level of innovation is potentially both system changing and very profitable,” Fish 2.0 Founder and Executive Director Monica Jain said. “We’re seeing the rise of ‘seatech’ – new monitoring, visibility, production and processing tools for the seafood industry – as well as other advances that remove barriers to growth and sustainability for fishers, farmers and buyers throughout the value chain.”
April 25, 2017 — The business competition Fish 2.0, now in its third installment, is evolving into a nexus of communication that is helping fight fragmentation in the seafood industry, according to its founding director Monica Jain.
Held every two years after an inaugural 2013 edition, Fish 2.0 is an open call for entrepreneurs and business owners in the seafood industry to propose their projects and get feedback from investors and industry professionals, as well as possible financial backing.
The four-phase competition pares the proposals it receives down to a group of finalists that present at Stanford University to a room full of investors, consultants and other businesses owners.
Jain said her original motivation behind creating the competition was to stimulate private investment in sustainable seafood, and the competition has certainly done that— companies that presented at the 2015 Stanford finals have raised more than USD 30 million (EUR 27.6 million), and include starts-ups including LoveTheWild and Acadia Harvest Inc.
But the competition has also created an unforeseen meeting point in a dispersed industry.
“The thing that we’re seeing is that more and more businesses are interested in our competition not just to meet investors, but to meet each other. There’s a lot of benefit for them meeting each other because the seafood industry is fragmented,” Jain said.
For the 2017 edition, Fish 2.0 held six workshops in different regions; Southeast Asia, Chile and Peru, the Pacific Islands, New England, the South Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico, and the U.S. West Coast.
At the U.S. West Coast workshop early this month in Seattle, entrepreneurs from California to Alaska discussed innovations and business ideas that ranged from submarine robots for patrolling aquaculture farms to salmon-based baby food to innovative fish handling techniques.
January 9, 2017 — There’s a global divide at the heart of the seafood industry: the businesses that most need new technologies are often continents away from the businesses creating them.
Small-scale seafood operations in Asia, Latin America, and Africa catch and farm most of the seafood we eat. Startups in the U.S., Canada, and Europe are developing most of the technologies that promise to improve logistics, traceability, fish feeds, and aquaculture production. But distance and limited resources mean these businesses rarely meet. Bridging this divide is an essential step toward both healthy oceans and a healthy, equitable food supply.
That’s one reason we open Fish 2.0 to a diverse range of seafood enterprises from around the world. The Fish 2.0 competition process not only helps ventures improve individually but builds trust and gives technology and product innovators the chance to find and connect with investors as well as other fishing businesses, seafood farmers, and technology creators. Finalists gain insights into parts of the supply chain previously hidden from them and are able to form relationships with like-minded entrepreneurs they otherwise would not have met. The result is new business partnerships that offer unique growth opportunities for investors, as well as solutions to the seafood industry’s most difficult problems.
Aquaculture innovators click
My favorite recent example is the new joint venture between 2015 Canadian finalist and track winner SabrTech and Thailand based runner-up Green Innovative Biotechnology (GIB). SabrTech’s RiverBox system reduces pollution from farm runoff and grows an algae-based feed from the captured wastewater. Bangkok-based GIB has developed a feed supplement that boosts the immune systems of farm-raised fish and shrimp, leading to higher growth rates, greater resistance to diseases such as early mortality syndrome, and lower feed costs. Both technologies solve aquaculture production and cost issues using naturally derived solutions.
Mather Carscallen, president and CEO of SabrTech, and Karsidete Teeranitayatarn, chief innovation officer of GIB, met during the pitch practice session for the Fish 2.0 finals at Stanford University last fall. Mather helped Karsidete polish his delivery, and the two learned enough about each other to want to stay in touch.