Biova Project, the First Beer Brewed from Food Waste, Nears €500,000 in Equity Crowdfunding

In just a few days, the equity crowdfunding campaign opened by Biova Project on Mamacrowd has almost reached €480,000, thanks to the contribution of 74 investors (with Agrofood BIC investing €100,000 and another €100,000 Arafin srl), exceeding the minimum target of €400,000 and aiming for the maximum target of €1.64 million. All are based on a pre-money valuation of 6 million.

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Biova Project fights food waste by promoting a circular economy and up-cycling

Founded in 2019 from an idea of Franco Dipetro and Emanuela Barbano, the startup has since passed two incubation programs, in Social Fare and in I3P (the Incubator of the Polytechnic of Turin), participated in B Heroes and has raised about €800,000 of capital from private investors since its foundation.

Biova Project bases its business on a precise idea: to save huge quantities of unsold bread, pasta, rice, fruits, and vegetables from inevitable waste and transform them into new products with high added value. The company, in other words, fights food waste by promoting a circular economy and up-cycling. It also offers a service to recover unsold food and processing by-products for businesses. The business strategy is also innovative: because those who supplied the unsold food become a sales channel themselves.

Biova Project, which has been an ISO 22000-certified B Corp since June

The company uses at least 30 percent secondary matter to produce its range of anti-waste beers and snacks, which are born from the recovery of production surplus. It has also developed proprietary technologies and recipes, operates throughout the country and in collaboration with many players in the food supply chain, and it is in this direction that important partnerships directed at saving raw material while avoiding waste and bringing new products to the market could be activated with some of the accelerator partners.

Currently, Biova Project has collaborations both on the retailer market front (Coop Nord Ovest, Carrefour, Cortilia, Ikea) and on the Horeca market front (Capatoast). All the way to hotel chains such as Melià, Mandarin Oriental, Nh, Radisson. The range of ‘eco-friendly’ beers now has seven references, four from reclaimed bread, two from broken pasta, and one from rice (for gluten-free).

From the spent grain, that is, what remains as a by-product of brewing, Biova Project has since created Ri-Snack, and is working on developing a new type of pasta.

With this equity crowdfunding campaign, Biova Project intends to “expand its capacity to recover and process unsold by building new treatment and logistics centers (Surplus Treatment Unit), invent and develop new circular economy products (in the pipeline is a sweet snack, a soft drink, and a range of spreadable creams), and raise awareness through a multichannel advertising campaign.” Meanwhile, turnover for the first four months of 2023 has already shown 270 percent growth compared to 2022, when the company turned over about €200,000.

“Every year in Europe 931 million tons of food are thrown away: 158.27 million tons come from bread, pastries, and cibisecchi. We breathe life back into unused food by transforming waste into new raw materials with which to create beers, snacks, and more,” said Dipietro, CEO and founder of Biova Project, who added, “The partnership with Agrofood BIC is of the utmost importance to us. Indeed, it represents an excellent opportunity to enhance our assets and begin a path of open innovation with leading companies in our sector. There are many possible synergies and we will have much to share, learn, and experiment together.”

“This partnership will result in new production paths capable of combining scientific innovation and consolidated agrifood expertise, with the aim of generating products that are the result of a circular economy of value for people’s well-being, with a view to maximum eco-sustainability. The food companies that are members of Agrofood BIC will be able to investigate direct collaborations by virtue of the shareholders’ agreements that bind the companies to the accelerator, and the start-up Biova will be able to benefit from an almost unique added value given by the possibility of being able to work having a very wide range of food products at its disposal,” said Agrofood BIC President Riccardo Piaggi.

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(Featured image by cerdadebbie via Pixabay)

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First published in Be Beez. A third-party contributor translated and adapted the article from the original. In case of discrepancy, the original will prevail.

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