Phage company wins €100K in investor backed dairy challenge
In partnership with Nestlé, GOKE, and Wageningen University, the Yield Lab, an early-stage investor in sustainable agtech, launched the Global Dairy Challenge earlier this year, inviting startups worldwide to present innovative technologies that can help solve pressing issues for the dairy sector such as emissions reduction, manure management and water quality.
After the final seven companies in the contest pitched to a panel of industry leaders on Tuesday evening in Amsterdam, The Yield Lab crowned PhageLab the winner live at the Animal Agtech Innovation Summit on Wednesday.
The biotech company secured €100K (US$109.3K) in investment funding to accelerate its technology, which is backed by a large bacteriophage repository and data-gathering capabilities.
With headquarters in Santiago, Chile, and offices in Brazil and Spain, PhageLab has over 10 years of experience partnering with poultry and livestock producers. It looks to target and eliminate specific bacterial pathogens through an AI-powered streamlined sample protocol.
Finalist line-up
The other finalists were Elysia Creative Biology, Antler Bio, NoBACZ Healthcare, Grassa, eFeed Life Science and Rumin8.
The jury included Gentiane Gorlier, general partner at the Yield Lab Europe and investment professional, Rinse Jan Boersma, founder and partner at Beluga Animal Health and animal health industry veteran, Ruud Duijghuisen, manager of business development at Wageningen Livestock Research, and Robert Erhard, head of dairy, corporate sustainable agricultural development, Nestlé.
To select the Dairy Challenge winner, those industry experts considered factors such as traction, strategy, business plan, unit economics, team, and impact.
Impact investment
David Bowles, managing partner, Yield Lab Europe, shared insights with us in August in relation to the initiative’s objectives:
“Yield Lab Europe is an impact investor, aiming to deliver environmental and financial returns equally. Our primary goal with this challenge is to foster innovation in dairy sustainability, potentially leading to new investment opportunities. Recognizing the dairy sector’s significant environmental footprint, we believe in its enduring economic and cultural importance. While sustainability discussions often focus on dairy alternatives, we are interested in technologies that enable more efficient production for a sustainable and equitable dairy supply chain.”
He emphasized the various areas ripe for innovation: “Many factors can improve production efficiency, from ruminant genetics and pasture management to milking robots and processing technologies.”