The Flemish Institute for Biotechnology (VIB) is not the most famous spot in the world of agritech. But, as a hub bringing together 1500 of the top-researchers from Belgian universities, it is, as Annick Verween says: “a bit of a hidden gem”.
Verween is the head of VIB’s Biotope Incubator, a pre-seed incubator programme and early investor that takes on promising early-stage start-ups and “gives them an MBA in biotech” to try and turn them into seed-stage companies within 18 months.
VIB launched Biotope in 2022 to bring its expertise in turning groundbreaking research into profitable companies – its track-record includes Biotalys, a now listed bio-control company – to other budding start-ups around the world.
Biotope is unusual on this front in that it acts as both incubator and investor. Start-ups join the incubator for an initial three-week basecamp which effectively acts as a selection process for a €250k investment package that comes alongside 18 months of support and access to VIB’s experts and cutting-edge R&D facilities.
Biotope’s philosophy is to help start-ups escape the viscious cycle in which they need investment to fix certain issues, but investors will not commit until those issues are fixed.
So far, 52 start-ups attended the basecamp, 13 got Biotope preseed investment of which three have raised seed rounds.
Verween herself is a marine biologist by trade who gradually migrated into biotech start-ups. After a spell as managing EIT Food’s RisingFoodStars community she joined VIB to launch Biotope to help those with good biotech but lacking the business acumen or the business start-ups who need to strengthen their biotechnology to bring them to market.
“Six years ago, this whole agritech start-up community was still a work in progress with lots of hype around it and a lot of money available to bet on successful horses,” she says.
“For me, the money went to the people who could really sell the potential of a technology meaning they were the storytellers. They were the ones who could convince people of promises.”
The problem, she continues, is there was – and still is – too much belief among investors that the people who build a company are a done deal with a clean route for turning an idea borne in a lab into a revenue-driving business.
Verween holds a refreshing attitude towards an agritech sector that often feels dominated by smart young guys with PhDs.
“Biotech has this complex connotation, but it can be much more basic,” she argues. “We must step away from this typical ‘you need to have done deep-tech in a university lab for six years and need to wear your lab coat from morning till evening.’
“We’ve had people who reached out to us without a PhD and asked if they can still apply. Which is the biggest nonsense when you’re an entrepreneur with a solution to a problem.”
Addressing the glass ceiling
Verween is also intent on helping shift the sector’s gender balance. “I’m still blown away by going to these pitching competitions and seeing it’s 85% young, white guys, 30 to 40.”
Biotope is therefore built on promoting diversity in everything from the structure of the teams to the language of the selection phase. It is not a bootcamp, for example, but a basecamp.
The plan seems to be working with 85% of Biotope’s portfolio companies now made up of mixed-gender teams, a proportion Verween estimates is about five times the sector average.
One of those is AmphiStar, a biosurfactant company which recently raised preseries A funding from external investors. AmphiStar was founded by a team of four – including three women – out of Ghent University, using waste products to make a biosurfactant.
It is one of the three firms in biotope’s portfolio which have successfully raised follow-up funding so far. Zymofix was disclosed earlier this week and one will follow very soon.
Its gradual success so far is indicative of Biotope’s approach. “The fact that we do not push start-ups through a programme where you need to drop everything for four months. You can still run your business, be there with your family, be flexible,” explains Verween.
“That’s definitely part of the secret, human sauce here.”
