What you’ve missed at the first-ever Startup Weekend Food in Malaysia

You’ve got 54h to feed 10 billion people. Ready? Set? GO!

12 min readDec 3, 2019

In November 2019, we brought the Food edition of Techstars Startup Weekend to Kuala Lumpur for the very first time, in the hope of encouraging more aspiring entrepreneurs to work on projects in a vertical which is currently underappreciated in the Malaysian ecosystem.

During the 54-hour event, groups of entrepreneurs, developers, designers and industry experts pitched their food & ag tech ideas, formed teams, and worked to develop a working prototype and presentation.

They then pitched their new startups to top F&B entrepreneurs and investors: Bryan Loo of Tealive, Sayed Azam Ali of Crops For the Future, Vandana Dhaul of GROW AgriFood Tech Accelerator, and Kengyew Tham of Supplybunny.

Highlights

33 participants pitched their ideas on the first day of the event. Both the high number of pitches, and their quality were unusual for a Startup Weekend — a result of most participants coming with pre-existing industry experience (food science and technology students, restaurant owners, farmers, and so on).
13 of the participants attracted others to join their teams, continued to work on their idea throughout the weekend, and finally pitched to a panel of high profile judges.
Participants spanned across age groups, with the youngest participant being 18-years old, and the oldest, 71-years old.
Participants traveled from as far as Malacca, Ipoh, Johor Bahru and Singapore to attend the event.
45% of the attendees and 50% of the mentors were female, an unusually high number of a startup event.

Day 1

Meet new entrepreneurial friends

Get to know your new friends. Meet the people you’ll be working with.

Pitch your food tech idea in 60s

Got an idea on how to feed 10 billion people by 2050? You’ve got 1 minute to pitch in front of the group.

Convince new team mates to join your cause

Whether it’s your idea or someone else’s, you’ll create a cross-functional team to work with over the weekend.

Day 2

Master the basics of Product Management

Charissa Ong (Design Lead, Boost) & Philip Seifi (CEO, Pona)

Moore’s template
Prioritization matrix
Customer interviews
Market validation

Learn to sell your vision to real investors

Oliver Capehorn (COO, Pona; Internationally-touring stand-up comedian)

Public speaking
Pitch deck design
Investor expectations
Handling Q&A sessions

Get feedback from industry experts

Experienced food & ag entrepreneurs, design professionals, food scientists, investors and government officials are there to coach you through the hard problems.

Day 3

Build an MVP and validate the market in 54h

We provide you with support, and advanced equipment ranging from 3D printers to a professional kitchen. You are responsible for everything from finding customers to building your product.

Pitch top food tech investors and entrepreneurs

The culmination of the weekend. You have 5 minutes to present the product or service you built to the crowd and a panel of experts.

Win a chance to compete on the world stage

Winning teams compete on the global stage through the Thought For Food Challenge, a leading global food & ag tech event, coming to Kuala Lumpur in March 2020.

Celebrate

Watch the other teams present and celebrate all the work you’ve done. Get the opportunity to talk to judges and mingle with mentors.

Teams

Each team was assigned a Soul Food, which they used to identify themselves throughout the event.

Team Carrot (Fablab)
Connecting restaurants with trustworthy suppliers.Team Octopus (Colourfood)
Translating food waste into a medium of art.Team Bronana (Nutrifairies; merger of Broccoli and Banana)
Delivering fresh, nutritious and tasty baby food.Team Brinjal (Shelf Life)
Providing a freshness index to reduce food waste.Team Watermelon (Gobekie)
Baking highly nutritious superfood cookies.Team Corn (FoodShare)
Giving surplus food from hotel buffet outlets a second chance.Team Cherries (Arice)
Connecting farmers with interested non-farmers.Team Coconut (BiteBox)
Helping healthy snacks enter office pantries.Team Jelly (Restlytic)
Providing restaurant & cafe customer analytics.Team Scones (Agroware)
Turning agrowaste into biodegradable food ware.Team Pizza (Insecta)
Turning insects into high-grade natural fish food.Team Capsicum (Lalu)
Providing a cloud drive-thru solution for independent restaurants.

Winners

1st prize: 🌽 TEAM CORN

Giving surplus food from hotel buffet outlets a second chance.

Edison, Khao Chung Siang, Kheshini, Koo Xi Moon

Thought For Food Challenge Fast Track
Tickets to Thought For Food 2020
Exclusive Mentorship by Thought For Food
3 months coworking at MaGIC

2nd prize: 🥕 TEAM CARROT

A smart one stop shop restaurant ecosystem.

Yong Wen, Lee Yan Zhuan, Tong Chii Haw, Edyvean, Dan, Tan Dai Yang

Tickets to Thought For Food 2020
Exclusive Mentorship by Thought For Food
3 months coworking at MaGIC

3rd prize: 🍌 TEAM BANANA

Nutritious, fresh, and tasty baby food delivered to your doorstep.

Wan Farihah, Nathan, Shakira, Surya Dharma, Brandon Chong

Exclusive Mentorship by Thought For Food
3 months coworking at MaGIC

Special prize for most pivots: 🐙 TEAM OCTOPUS

Giving new life to ‘cast off’ foods, translating them into mediums of art.

Tien, Frankie, Mindy, Tammy

1 month consulting by Startup Malaysia

Speaker

Shankar R. Santhiram

Managing Consultant, EQTD

Shankar is the Managing Consultant at EQTD. He has a daily radio show on Lite Malaysia, and writes a weekly column for The New Straits Times. Shankar’s career spans over 20 years, including multiple successful restaurants and online F&B businesses. He is currently writing a book called “Why Food is Everything?” with international celebrity chef David Rocco.

Judges

Bryan Loo

CEO, Tealive

Bryan is an award-winning entrepreneur behind a diverse portfolio of F&B brands including Tealive, Sodaxpress, Tearush, Gindaco, Croissant Taiyaki, Define:food, and Ko Ko Kai. His company has over 1700 employees and serves over 3.5 million customers across more than 250 outlets locally, and overseas.

Sayed Azam Ali

CEO, Crops For the Future

Sayed is the CEO at Crops For the Future, an international organisation with a mandate to promote and facilitate the greater use of underutilised crops for enhanced diversification of agricultural systems and human diets. He is also Chair of the Association of International Research and Development Centers for Agriculture (AIRCA), and former Vice Provost of The University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus.

Vandana Dhaul

Head, GROW AgriFood Tech Accelerator

Vandana is Head of GROW, Singapore’s first global Agtech and Foodtech accelerator. It provides a unique value proposition to local, regional and international agtech and foodtech startups and scaleups and will support growth in the ASEAN agrifood ecosystem.

Kengyew Tham

Co-Founder & CEO, Supplybunny

Today, Kengyew is the CEO of Supplybunny, a B2B startup aimed at connecting 40,000 restaurants in Malaysia to the best suppliers located near them. Prior to entering the food tech space, he worked as a Computer Engineer at several startups in Silicon Valley.

Mentors

Johnathan Lee

Executive Director, MaGIC

Johnathan is the Executive Director of Ecosystem Development at the Malaysian Global Innovation & Creativity Centre, an agency under the Ministry of Entrepreneur Development. He has extensive business development and investment experience from both the commercial and social impact sectors, and has spoken and mentored at dozens of startup events around the world.

Eileen Feng

Country Manager, Shopline

Eileen is the Country Manager at Shopline, a DIY e-commerce platform for Asia. She previously acted as General Manager of honestbee, a major grocery & food delivery platform, and as the COO of Offpeak, a food discovery platform offering discounts and dining privileges.

Charissa Ong

Design Lead, Boost

Charissa has been a User Experience Design Lead at Boost e-wallet since its launch, after working as a Strategic Designer at McKinsey. She has varied experience from graphic and motion design, to product and user experience.

Yuet Kim Lim

Co-Founder & CEO, PichaEats

Kim Lim is the co-founder of PichaEats, a social enterprise that aims to empower refugees that can cook in Malaysia through a food delivery and catering service. Besides involving herself greatly into the work of the social sector and economic empowerment, she is also a musician and a composer.

Rachel Loh

Co-Founder, AgriMatch

Rachel is passionate about the intersection of sustainability, business and technology, and wants to help make sure the world doesn’t exist one-third rich and two-thirds hungry. Through AgriMatch, an agri-tech social enterprise founded under the Telenor Youth Forum and Nobel Peace Foundation, she aims to empower farmers by optimising the agri-value chain and combating food insecurity with digital connectivity.

Teng Lee

F&B Consultant

Startup Advisor and angel investor. Strong food science and nutrition background with 5yrs in food formulation consultation and 3yrs in F&B technology and business advisory. Currently advising two startups and one F&B chain.

Zoey Chan

Co-Founder, Life Origin

Zoey is Co-Founder of Life Origin, a social enterprise that breeds black soldier flies to create sustainable alternative protein, feed the world, and save the environment. Zoey first ventured into F&B right after high school, followed by a successful exit, before taking a break in Singapore to focus on her studies in accounting.

Antonnio Hong

COO, Ento

Antonnio is the former Head of Strategy & Corporate Planning at Hong Leong Bank, and current COO of Ento, a Malaysian artisan cricket roaster. His professional experience spans across Singapore, USA, China, West Europe and Malaysia.

Ermanno Cima Vivarelli

General Manager, Campbell House

Ermanno is an industry veteran with hospitality and food & beverage experience at over a dozen renowned hotels, restaurants, cruises and resorts across Europe and Asia.

Sai Kit Ng

Chief Executive, Captii Ventures

Sai Kit is the Chief Executive of Captii Ventures, a multistage investor in technology companies in Southeast Asia with an aggregate of sixteen investments across Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Philippines and Vietnam.

Patricia Foo

Program Manager, Big Idea Ventures

Patricia is the Program Manager at Big Idea Ventures, a Singapore-based VC investing in food companies focused on plant-based products and new protein alternatives.

Gray Ham

Social Media Specialist, Wunderman Thompson

Gray is a Social Media Specialist, with a focus on Data & Analytics at Wunderman Thompson, and a background in Computer Science and Product Design. He has worked on projects for multinational clients including Nestlé and Marigold.