Big Idea Ventures has launched our very own podcast “The Big Idea Podcast: Food”. Each week Big Idea Ventures Founder Andrew D. Ive will speak with some of the most innovative minds in the food space and talk about the exciting projects they are a part of.
To listen to the episode click the links below!
Podcasts
- Sticher: https://www.stitcher.com/show/the-big-idea-food-podcast
- Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/57TBllxq5CjpdVzzhNGjBp?si=u0hbKJqVQqqpkmyAv28ETg&dl_branch=1&nd=1
- Google Podcast: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkLnBvZC5jby90aGUtYmlnLWlkZWEtcG9kY2FzdC1mb29k
- Apple Podcasts:
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-big-idea-podcast-food/id1564457496
To learn more about Maya Milk check out the links below!
Maya Milk: https://www.mayamilk.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/mayamilk/people/
Andrew D Ive
Welcome to the Big Idea podcast where we focus on food. My name is Andrew D Ive, I’m the host and founder of Big Idea ventures. Today we’ll be talking to Maya milk, a company that is creating buyer natural products in the dairy and milk space. Using precision fermentation. I look forward to the conversation. Hope you enjoy it too. Please do like and subscribe. I love to engage more with you and let you know when the new podcasts are coming down. Many thanks. Hi, Murat. This is Andrew from the big idea podcast. Welcome to our, you know, to our conversation today. Welcome to the podcast. How are you, sir?
Murat Badur
Hi, Andrew. Thanks for having me. I’m doing great actually prepared for the holidays. It’s been an American past five months during the accelerator program with big idea ventures. And yeah, now preparing to take a break. Actually.
Andrew D Ive
Me too. I’m really looking forward to holidays. So why don’t we start off by who is Morat? What? You know, who are you? What are you doing? What are you up to? What’s the story? Morning Glory?
Murat Badur
Yes. So I started off my career as a software developer. Back in early 2000s. In San Francisco, I worked as a software programmer in the financial industry. And for for doing for about at least a decade, I’d be working with software and, and mobile, and an after den, I decided that I wanted to do biotech. And at the time, there were talks of biotech boom in early 2000s, at bay area, which never happened. And we just kept on waiting and waiting. And interesting, just for the past five years, the lot of progress has happened in biotech. And when I heard that actually, poo tick is used to utilizing biotech, and a lot of progress has been made in those technologies. It sounded like it’s a great opportunity. So that’s, that’s how I actually pivoted from software to biotech and eventually ended up in in food industry and look for opportunities where we can utilize biotechnology to create novel ways of producing food. And, yes, that’s how we ended up making Maya Milk.
Andrew D Ive
Okay, so software developer, Silicon Valley, you decided you wanted to change to biotech from software? What what was driving that sort of? Was it about doing something more interesting was to I want to make money, like, what made you sort of go from, you know, being in what is the software capital of the world? Or, you know, I’m sure there are people screaming at the audio right now for No, it’s not, it’s somewhere else. But you know, arguably one of the software capitals of the world. And you’re right there as a software developer, and you decide to pivot what’s what’s driving that?
Murat Badur
Well, the main reason was, when social and digital media was taking it over. I just felt like continuously there was the same problems in interest. And those problems were, I was under the impression that they were not really fixing real world problems. And not that there’s anything wrong with social media or digital marketing and that but I just felt like I just want to work in fields such as biotech, where you actually create a real or result a real world problem. And the pivoting point was when I when I read the article about Memphis meats back in 2016 it was the first time I heard that lab grown meat was actually not a not an idea, but it was materializing. And when I heard about that company, I was like that was the pivotal point I’m like, Dad, that is unbelievable. And then when I heard that culture meeting was actually happening, I thought this would be the technology area that I want to be involved and and since then, I kept researching and and followed up with the pioneers in the Indian food tech industries and and look for any opportunities were actually working and work in and get to know the industry better. So yes, I can say that and in an interesting way that also happened at bay area. As far as I remember method speed was was phased in San Francisco, I’m sure is still is although they change a brand nowadays you’re upset who’s But I can say yes, that was that was the pivotal point. And, and I really love the idea that that could be a transforming technology transforming industrial animal agriculture, which has been a problem for for a long time. And we knew we know that from environment, environmental point, and also the footprint that these industrial, animal agriculture has to change and transport. And when I saw that biotech is actually helping us change that transform that that was that was the that was it. That’s it, that’s when I decided that I want to be involved. Okay,
Andrew D Ive
I guess what I’m sort of wondering about is, are you were you driven to it because of, it’s, it’s sort of the next big problem to solve, or the next interesting thing to sort of be focused on? Or are you driven towards it because of the you are looking to have an impact from a climate change perspective, or sort of a new food perspective, I mean, I’m not sure if that’s kind of key, but always interesting to understand what’s making somebody change their entire career and go in a new direction.
Murat Badur
I can say all of them had the effect, I can say there was the technological challenge, from an engineering perspective, to create something novel using biotech, making lab grown meat working at the cellular level, even at the molecular level, in terms of fermentation and, and genetic engineering. That was that technological challenge was very appealing. And on the other hand, your solve resolving one of the real hard problems in the ecosystem, transforming animal agriculture. And that was that that was also very appealing, and also the environmental footprint. And, and all together, I think they all amplified and complimented. So it just felt like the sweet spot, the intersection point, the common denominator, all those effects. So I can say all together, it really was so exciting to be working in those fields.
Andrew D Ive
So you’re the founder or co founder of Maya milk. As a software programmer, I’m guessing your educational background was not in biotech? Or was it? Were you like a PhD in, in one of the sciences apart from computer science or not at all?
Murat Badur
No, I don’t have biotech or biotechnology biology background actually. Nor did I have computer science science background, I studied architecture and undergrad. And after my receiving my architecture degree, right, I moved to United States and to get my MBA in finance. And that was my first pivot from architecture to to finance, and from there to technology. And what I learned early, actually was late 90s, that technology was used in finance and computational. All the algorithms was actually utilized in finance, I thought, well, technology is break. So I decided that I should work in a financial startup that is using software. And I ended up working in a startup company in San Francisco. And it was financial engineering, and, and then back office systems for global banks. So that’s when I got to learn about technology and software and become a software developer. And yeah, and years out there working in software, biology was always in the back of my mind, because I loved biology in high school, but never had the chance to practice. And being in Bay Area. As I said, we’re always waiting for that biotech boom, because there was so much promises made. We thought that was that would be the Transforming Technologies in in lots of areas and, and for the past couple of years, especially with the with the COVID effects. Now we see that biology is actually industrialized and use in many therapies, and that has very fast and direct effects in human life.
Andrew D Ive
So for those founders out there who are wanting to get involved in, you know, this space, the future of food, biotech, especially biotech around the food space, you’re sort of the poster child of somebody who didn’t go do the PhD. I’m not, you know, I guess what I’m saying is, there are other ways ways of getting there rather than going and doing a biology degree or, or PhD or related. You can, you can actually go in a much more sort of indirect, you know, route to get there. I mean right now, my a milk, whatever, and we can we can dig in, dig into Maya milk. You’ve talked about Memphis meat being a sort of key stimulator for your kind of motivator for you, Maya milk is not a meat company, right? That’s right, I guess, guessing the milk name. I say, I’m guessing, but we invested and I know exactly what you do. So I shouldn’t try and pretend I don’t. But what why don’t you for the sake of everybody else? Take us through the Maya milk vision. And you know, what you guys are folk focused on accomplishing?
Murat Badur
Well, you’re at Maya Milk is not a cultivated meat company. Although, when I learned about all these new technologies, cellular agriculture and and lab meat was the was the first research area that I that I did, actually, because cold and eating meat was was the was the thing that that was making the headlines. And that’s what I actually started researching and with my molecular biologist, friends, but we took a deep dive into the technology and try to learn more. But only after dead I reload realize they’re not only cultivated meat, but there’s also other pillars. We know already plant based products already proliferating market. And then I learned about the precision fermentation. And maybe from an engineering perspective perspective, I thought programming micro organisms and and utilizing them in precision fermentation. It just to me it was more appealing then and then cultivated meat. It’s not that there’s not these challenges in cultivating it is a tremendous challenge is that a biotech but for some reason, fermentation, I thought was more from an engineering perspective, maybe for my software background, that programming cells programming the genome of microbial strains, it just add that field to me. And from there, I took a took some bio informatics classes and tried to learn but how do you actually reprogram a cell or app or a microorganism and and to make it induce it to produce a target or desired product that you want it to produce? And so in that respect, I thought fermentation, precision fermentation, particularly had more room for genetic engineering, and, and probably programming and, and helping us do computational biology, I think that’s, that would be the ultimate goal to to leverage all these technologies and do computational biology. So I thought that would be very cool that I want to teach. And, but I still like to see cultured meat making hitting the markets and a chat way to taste it actually.
Andrew D Ive
So for someone who’s sort of getting into this space for the first time. What do you mean by computational biology or, you know, manipulation of sales using computations? I want to kind of keep it at a level that everybody can get access to, so that there’s not people walking away from this conversation scratching their head a little bit?
Murat Badur
Sure, yes. Let me tell you about a given example as to what kind of computational or while genome engineering, we deal with the precision permutation. We’re actually working with microbial strains and these microbial strains has been existed for 1000s of years, and we’ve been working on them, even though we did not recognize them. 10,000 years ago, he did Neolithic era, but we actually did fermentation. And we call that traditional interpretation, which actually enhanced the food that we had back then, maybe cheese or milk, and even made it more durable and increase the shelf life so that we can store those cheese and other dairy ingredients that were produced 1000s of years ago, even though we had no clue about the microbial ecosystem back then, but we still utilize them.
Andrew D Ive
So we have in other words, we’ve been fermenting beer, cheese, you know, bread, other things for hundreds and hundreds of years as a way of improving taste, texture, longevity, and so on. Right
Murat Badur
Exactly, that’s what I’ve been using enhancing. And we’re actually kind of getting good at it too. We have the indirectly, we we had them evolve. And we kind of use the directed evolution, even though we did not know about those biological processes. So, those traditional methods actually worked all throughout the millennia. And now even our grandmas know how those techniques work to get to make produce better teas and do yoga. And well, with the help of genome engineering and ever since early 2000s, is we crack the code of DNA and eventually, the code of other organisms and, and now microorganisms so that we know how those directed evolution has worked on those microbials strains and other organisms. So now we can read the DNA, the code, and now we can actually manipulate that code and reprogram it to to have it produce the desired biomolecules and target molecules that we’d like to use in food industry or cosmetics, or any other food. biotech area. So yeah, I guess that’s, maybe I kind of said in a more indirect way, but in the end, yes, we are, we are working with the genome of microorganisms and, and we can read the DNA and, and program it. And then and then have more effective evolutionary techniques to to induce them and, and work the way we want to.
Andrew D Ive
So if we, for example, can manipulate those microorganisms? Because we understand that DNA? Are we doing that to make them produce different things? Are we doing that to make them more productive? Are we doing that to slow down a process speed up? I’m wonder I’m sort of wondering what kind of things we can do by by sort of tweaking the DNA of these micro organisms? And what’s the kind of end? And well, I would guess it depends on you know, what your objective is, but what are the kinds of things generally that you can do with those micro organisms by manipulating their DNA? And how does that play into what you want to accomplish specifically with Maya Milk?
Murat Badur
Yes, well, actually, we can do all sorts of things, we can have them produce entirely new proteins or, or fats that the microorganism does not do natively, we can introduce new new ways of synthesizing these target molecules, or proteins and lipids, or we can have the microorganism express those native, natively produce proteins, and then have it be make making more productive. So in different methods depends on the objective as to what you want to what you’d like to accomplish. There, there are a lot of things you can do, and with the new technologies that we’re currently using, such as plasmids, and now we’re talking about CRISPR methods, and once those technologies are leveraged, then we can I can say, just programming these microorganisms would even get more, much more easier. So, in that respect, with my milk, we’d like to have yeast strains produce milk proteins and lipids, and those milk proteins and lipids are needed or not needed to to the yeast strains, we’re actually barn borrowing them from from cows and other macro animals, micro macro organisms. So we’re introducing new genes to these micro organisms and, and we have to work we have to understand their genome and math to make sure that they’re stable and they can actually work with the, the foreign DNA that we’re, we’re transforming to them. And, and have them work in a stable way and and effectively and, and yeah, and then produce the, the proteins I think, is that we’d like to we desire.
Andrew D Ive
So what’s the elevator pitch? Or sort of the simple vision of Maya Milk? If someone says, you know, what do you guys do without going into the programming piece and the sort of the broader explanation we’ve had today? What’s this? What’s that one sentence or two that will encapsulate for everybody listening what Maya Milk wants to accomplish, or is accomplishing for that matter?
Murat Badur
Yes, Maya Milk is from precision fermentation company producing proteins and lipids that are animal free. And in the end, we’d like to produce milk that is similar to animal milk, but without using animals. So we’re trying to take the animals out of the equation. Yet, we’d like to introduce and offer consumers a taste that is indistinguishable from animal counterparts.
Andrew D Ive
So nature identical milk, using precision fermentation, a process that traditionally has been used for for beer and breads, and brewing and other things, to create nature identical milks, and I guess from those milks, you can then go do other things as well. Right cheese, and butter and related related products. Correct?
Murat Badur
Exactly, there’s so many consumer facing applications you can possibly use with these proteins and lipids. And even in dairy, there are a lot of there are a lot of applications such as, such, as you say cheese, and even cheese has so many, so many performance criteria, you’d like to have cheese stretchy, or you have to have that, that tastes and, and sensory properties, and you like to match that aged cheese and that sophisticated taste, and a lot of a lot of actually parameters that are involved. And as for milk, you’d like to have a mitt that is more creamy, that is more, more headed that mouthfeel and sensory properties. And as for other data products, there’s so many things you can improve with the key functionalities and, and make make it more tasty for consumers that like to try alternative theory products and help them transition much, much easier way. Yeah.
Andrew D Ive
So when when did you begin Maya Milk?
Murat Badur
We started experimenting back in May of 220 21, which is about six months ago, right before then we did some literature research and tried to understand whether we can do this in a experimental way. And, and yeah, and soon after a couple of months later, we got into lab and we didn’t few months, we were able to make our proof of concept with whey protein that is one of the prominent proteins in milk. And later on, we tried to produce casein and and other fatty acids that are that are in milk.
Andrew D Ive
So basically, you’re less than a year old. Yes, there’s what three to 533 to five people in the company at this point.
Murat Badur
Yes, we’re currently four and next week we’ll be will be CES. So 50% increase before the year end,
Andrew D Ive
you’re growing faster than your yeast. Exactly. So that’s fantastic. So it’s really great to speak to a company that’s less than a year old. Because I actually I know where you were, you know, four months ago, because that’s kind of four or five months ago, because that’s when we started engaging. And now, in the last four months, you’ve you’ve, you basically jumped forward about two years in my estimations of where you’re at as a company. What do you think 2022 is, and I hate to date, the podcast, because anyone listening to this in sort of, you know, 2023 is like, oh shit, this was this is at least a year old. But you know, we’re coming into 2022 January will be with us in a in a blink. What for you is 2022 all about? For Maya Milk? What do you what are you guys focused on? What do you hope to accomplish in that in that next 12 months
Murat Badur
2022 We’re hoping that would be the year we actually produce what we had done so far in lab at a large scale and get closer to the industrial scale. We’re kind of getting bored and working in lab and we just want to see these products actually produce at large scale and cater to the industry. And that’s what we can’t wait to see. And we’re hoping that 2022 would be the year that we we get closer to industrial scale and and that and that we validate actually what the producing lab can be extrapolated to the industry and we can actually yeah, produce that high scale and and cater to the dairy industry and make sure that our proteins are produced that large scale so far we were able to see them and with the molecular biology tools and and detect them that yes, that’s there and we were able to purify grams off these products. But yeah, from toys to a to we’d like to produce by kilos. And if we’re lucky, maybe by tonnes who never know.
Andrew D Ive
So I mean, the description of what you’re doing and the kind of areas you’re dealing with in the beginning, you were talking about sort of computational manipulation of organisms and things like that. For someone who’s not normally not in this space, that sounds a little bit sort of intimidating, or even a little bit scary, doesn’t sound very sort of farmyard, and nature II and you know, that’s organic, let’s put it that way. You’re going to have to go through any form of regulatory approvals or any form of acceptance by the Food Standards or regulatory environment, before you can start selling your product in large quantities, or because brewing has been a central part of our food production now, for hundreds of years. Is it much easier to go through that process than then one would expect?
Murat Badur
That’s a great point, actually, Andrew, I mean, yes, regulatory is, is that’s what we’d like to initiate next year. And we’re hoping that we can finalize a regulatory procedures by 2023, before we go to market, because we have to get that done. But the good thing is, I know it sounds scary. And, and trust me, and also, I tried to try to eat organic, and I’m very picky in terms of food and try to be healthy as much as possible. But the interesting thing is what we’re working on these genetically engineering, organism, microorganisms, and these computational techniques, these are only the processes that we’re working with. These are not in the final product, and they’re not the products that we’re going to consume. They are the processes and these processes are, are done to produce these naturally identical products. So the end product that we’re going to consume is going to be the same as what cow would do. So in that respect, GMOs are just used to produce these proteins and fatty acids, but they’re definitely not in the end product. So we won’t be consuming GMOs, but we’re using these GMO techniques and, and organisms to produce the desired products that we’d like to consume.
Andrew D Ive
So they’re, so they’re the tools, the the nails, the hammers, the kind of processes you need to go through, but the actual output is not is actually nature identical to milk. So under a microscope, looking at milk looking at your product, it should be indistinguishable.
Murat Badur
Exactly, yes.
Andrew D Ive
So that in that case, is there not a requirement for any sort of regulatory sign off? I mean, if you can’t tell the difference, if it’s actually identical, why would they even have an opinion? Why would they need to have an opinion? You know, okay, one, one gets created through the, you know, the, the processes inside of a cow, the other gets developed through the processes outside of a cow, but in some ways, probably quite similar processes. Maybe. So I’m wondering why the regulatory environment would need to even get involved? Or is that a silly question? It’s a silly question. Tell me Tell me a silly question.
Murat Badur
No, that’s a great question. I actually answered it. Thank you. It’s the process, I think that’s that plays a major role, because in the end, the end product is not is not exactly the same as the nature counterparts. So but the process is, is different. So far, we did not use these genetically modified organisms to produce food products before Well, we did it to a certain extent, because a lot of people don’t realize but this chi motion enzyme that is used to do cheese has been produced in similar techniques by using precision fermentation for for more than a decade now. Even longer, but now we’re getting we’re seeing these techniques used in lot a lot of different other areas and a lot of different proteins and lipids that we’re going to consume. So you’re right, the process is that is definitely different. They’re not these processes before was from traditional way of animal agriculture and, and other industries. But now these techniques are used in the lab. So we have to get these approvals for the processes that we’re working with. As for the end product, it will be it will be that will be easy. case to prove that the end product is actually molecularly as sane as the animal counterparts, so, but the good thing is there’s already precedent approvals that has been designated by FDA, to the products that’s, that’s been fermented with precision permutation technology. So we’re hoping that we’re gonna get through as fast as possible. Since we have the precedent, the designation is already assigned by FDA. So you’re,
Andrew D Ive
you’re currently are you still in San Francisco? Where are you today?
Murat Badur
I’m currently in Turkey. This is where we do our r&d operations.
Andrew D Ive
And where’s the where is Maya Milk going to be based?
Murat Badur
Turkey? We’re going to keep our r&d lab in Turkey. And we already formed our US parent company in United States. And we’d like to have our precious United States as well as Turkey.
Andrew D Ive
Okay, I’m asking the question, because you talked about FDA, but I know that you’re a Turkish company. But you started off your career in Silicon Valley. So I was sort of, you know, a wee joy. Are you guys going to be joining the dots between the US and Turkey over the next year or so it sounds like you are? Yes, definitely. And what why is that? Why do you think that either the US or Turkey have something to contribute to this? What’s the environment like in both of those locations? And how? And how do they contribute to what you know, my male wants to accomplish?
Murat Badur
Well, United States is spearheading the alternative protein industry. And that’s where the innovation started. And that’s where innovation is progressing. So being there is is crucial for Maya Milk. So we can be part of that ecosystem. And in terms of running r&d operations in Turkey, there’s so many molecular biologist, scientist biochemist, like to have the opportunity to work in the field. And since I’m Turkish, and I have the network here, it makes total sense to do our research and development, and even collaborate with prospective scientists in the United States, most probably in Bay Area in San Francisco through my network. So I, I like to, I love to bridge that gap between these two countries and, and have Maya Milk. Work operate in multiple countries, actually. And we see that food technologies in an interesting way. Unlike other technology companies, food is everywhere you see from multiple nations, multiple countries, making promises and making strides in food tech, and location I thought I don’t think should matter. And in the end, the ultimate goal is to produce food every, in every location decentralize the production of food production, actually. And that’s the ultimate goal. And, and being in Turkey and United States, I think it’s the best way to test that. Perfect.
Andrew D Ive
So I know that, you know, when we’ve been working together, between my American Big Idea ventures, you’ve had the ability to access some of the partners that we’ve, you know, brought on board as part of our fund and so on. Have you been have you? Have you engaged with any of those partners so far? Do you think they’re going to be useful as Maya Milk starts to kind of focus on 2022 2023?
Murat Badur
Definitely. And that’s what I one of the, one of the aspects of, that’s one of the aspects of working with big idea Ventures is is your network with your limited partners, especially to put the industry and that’s what I actually enjoys so much to get to know the industry, from technology to the end product, and establishing these relationships and collaborating with the with your partners that that’s been very helpful. And I like to carry on and, and connect and collaborate even more. Perfect.
Andrew D Ive
So what 2022 2023 Anyone listening? What kind of help outside of the, you know, the immediate organization? If anyone’s listening, what kind of help would you guys say if anyone’s listening it’s kind of sad. I’m assuming loads and loads 1000s of people are listening. But for those listening what Can they do for Maya Milk? What? What would be
Murat Badur
helpful for you? That’s a tough question actually, because we need help in every aspect, we need help to, to promote the industry to promote the field that we work working, and, and get help in, in, in marketing and try to get help in introducing us to, to the food, global food industry, and, and in global networks and be able to know and that will be that will be great. So far, we’ve been the the alternative protein industry and and it’s actually establishing is very, very new. And we’d like to be known, actually, we’d like to have our voices heard. And yeah, and get help in many respects.
Andrew D Ive
So let me set let me sort of the thing, the thing that occurs to me is, one, you’re going to need probably more great people, as you scale the business. So you know, there’s people that there’s the opportunity for someone who’s interested in your mission, who might have, for example, a science background or certain backgrounds. For them to reach out as potential recruits or, or advisors. That’s probably one thing. Secondly, I’m guessing at some point in 2022, you’ll be looking to raise more funds. So you know, I’m guessing you’ll want to connect with people who are interested in potentially financially getting involved in what Maya Milk is all about? Or do you have an endless supply of capital that I’m not not aware of?
Murat Badur
We’re always in need money are the always that’s one of the Yeah, I mean, biotech is consuming so much. In any, in any step of the way, we’re going to need money that says certain. And yes, whomever like to invest in contribute more than welcome. And you’re right, we need mentorship, we need advisory board that is very powerful, they can help us actually establish sales and distribution channels. And we definitely have to work with collaborate with a lot of scientists and, and discuss these novel ways of producing proteins and lipids that we’re currently working with, in in many respects, that we’d like to have. We’d like to collaborate and get advice and mentorship. In terms of
Andrew D Ive
the traditional dairy industry, what do you see that reception of of Maya Milk Bing, do you think they some of them might see you guys as potential partners and collaborators? Or are? Or is the industry seeing this? Seeing this as a threat? What’s your experience, if any, with the industry to date,
Murat Badur
industry is very smart, they see what’s happening, they see the transformation. That is that is happening, that will happen within a decade or two. And they’re preparing for that, and which is great. You see these large companies, large dairy companies, and they’re collaborating with the startups. And in an interesting way, what I what I observe is that a lot of companies are trying to resolve these issues with third parties and startups and the conventional traditional ways to have these companies work in house and resolve these problems and innovate with their resources. But it seems like we’re more in a collaborative landscape. That is that is supporting and pushing startups forward. So in that respect is very exciting. And, and you see these big brand names and big companies and food and dairy companies already actually strategizing and collaborating with a startup. So in that respect, I don’t see any any problems that would? Yeah, that would impede such progress. So I think there’s a lot of opportunities for startups and or even for the large, big companies. And it’s nice to see that transformation is already happening.
Andrew D Ive
Perfect. So if someone wants to become either an employee of Maya, an advisor, an investor, a partner in some way, whether it’s from the traditional meat, milk industry or anywhere else, what’s the best way of getting hold of you and engaging with Maya milk?
Murat Badur
In any means, actually, through Big Idea ventures, my email is there, our website is there and LinkedIn. And by any means, we’d like to meet people in the industry and, and connect and collaborate.
Andrew D Ive
So give us give us your website details right now. Give us any, you know, the best ways of reaching out to you so that they don’t have to go to big idea ventures.com If they don’t want to. So Maya Milk M-A-Y-A, M I L K.com, correct. Yes, that’s donate. You can find us on LinkedIn and you have a college. Okay, so LinkedIn, Maya milk, your website has a way to reach out to you guys if people want to engage.
Murat Badur
Yes, we have our email addresses the you can connect and also has the integration to LinkedIn profiles. So you can see our individual profiles on LinkedIn as well.
Andrew D Ive
And even you’re fine with people just reaching out directly to you via LinkedIn, and offering their support and help. Definitely. Awesome. When do you expect to next be in the US?
Murat Badur
I’ll be there in late March. Actually, there’s the food tech conference in San Francisco, which I’m planning to attend. And yes, I’ll be there in the conference at two tech conference, the one of the reading events.
Andrew D Ive
That’s the future food tech conference in San Francisco March.
Murat Badur
Yes, that’s right. Future blue tech conference. Perfect.
Andrew D Ive
So if anyone wants to engage with Murat, Badur, you can do so via Maya milk.com. You can also do it by a big idea ventures. Also, within the Maya milk website, the LinkedIn profiles of the employees and key team members are all up there. So you can engage directly that way to any last thoughts for either entrepreneurs or people excited about whether it’s precision fermentation or, or these kind of new techniques or producing very sort of traditional foods, any any last parting thoughts or words?
Murat Badur
I think the whole industry, eventually, especially the technology aspect is going to be multidisciplinary. So we’d like to work with engineers, scientists, biochemists, chemists in everyday life in a lot of different fields. And that’s what makes it very exciting. This is not only about good size, but this is actually a collaboration of multidisciplinary scientific methods. So, in that respect, we’d love to expand our network. We’d like to work with food industry, food scientists, scientists in many different fields. And yes, and we need to collaborate because the problem is very complicated and challenging. So yeah, we need help from every, every industry. Perfect.
Andrew D Ive
And indeed, not just science, if you’re thinking about scaling this, you’re going to start getting into kind of areas of production, production, engineering, etc. And then obviously, there’s always the financing required to move towards that scale up, then you’ve got distribution and all sorts of other things. So, you know, it’s not just scientists, it’s going to be multidisciplinary, multi disciplinary, and across every area of business, I would imagine because this is going to be a multi trillion dollar industry ultimately,
Murat Badur
definitely, it’s huge. I mean, the whole food industry is going to transform and change within a couple of decades and that’s coming fast. What’s exciting is just a couple days ago in National Turkish TV I heard that animal agriculture is about to change and that it is no longer sustainable and that’s been heard the national news in Turkish TV and turkeys in agriculture economy as well and a bearish traditional in that respect. So even here, all around the world, we can see that that people are aware of this change and is happening and you’re right. The holy I mean, a lot of industrial engineers by process engineers that procedures Yes, I mean, there’s gonna be a lot of new fields to work with and, and a lot of disciplines gonna contribute to this change and help transport the animal agriculture and, and yeah, and future food is happening
Andrew D Ive
is the one thing I love about the story is people see will often see changes threatening. You know, we’ve got farmers and agriculture people involved In a very treated in the sort of more rural more traditional areas, sometimes see what’s happening in these areas in your areas and other areas like it as threatening disparte new jobs, new ways of developing more traditional foods, those places that have been the rural food producing centers of many, many countries will, will continue, in my opinion to be the food producing centers into, you know, way into the future. They’ll just do it in new ways, new tools, new, you know, new tools, new tools, new processes, but they will continue to be critical to, you know, keeping us alive and sustaining our population. So, not not threatening just change is sort of how I see it. But, you know, I’m sure there’ll be people who want to kind of write in and tell me how wrong I am saying something like that.
Murat Badur
I don’t think so. Because the threat is not competing industries, actually. Because the threat is the climate. And it’s obvious. So, yeah, I mean, we need to collaborate that that’s it. I mean, this is not about competition, among other industries or companies. This is more than that. So, yeah, we need to join forces against the climate threats,
Andrew D Ive
and evolve. And it’s an evolution of the industry. It’s not a new industry, a different industry. It’s the same industry, using new tools, new ways of doing things.
Murat Badur
Exactly, just transforming deep technologies.
Andrew D Ive
So Miranda, appreciate your time today. I will encourage anyone who’s listening to reach out to you, I know you’re a very friendly, friendly chap, and your team are very open to collaborators, supporters, advisors, funders, etc. So thanks for your time today. And that’s it. That was the big idea podcast where we focus on food. Another one in the cam. Thank you so much, sir. Thanks, Tiger.
Murat Badur
Thanks again for having me.
Andrew D Ive
Thanks for coming along to the conversation today. I hope you found it as interesting and enjoyable as I did. If there are people you think we should talk with, that you want to hear from, that you think would be great guests on the podcast, please do reach out to us. Please do like and subscribe so that we can let you know when the next podcasts are coming. That’s it amazing things happening in the world of food, lots of innovation, lots of magic being created by entrepreneurs, especially entrepreneurs in combination with some of the better corporate players in this space. You know, we need we need both. We need the innovators. We also need the ability to scale those innovations so that we can have the sustainability impacts we’re looking for and not have to kind of give up on performance or taste or any of the things we’ve grown up loving about our food. So that’s it. Hope you had a good time. Hope you enjoyed it. Please do like and subscribe and add your comments. Until next time,
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