SXSW Pitch Finalist: Plantible Foods
The Forrest Four-Cast: March 3, 2020
Plantible Foods wants to contribute to a more sustainable and responsible future while meeting the food needs of a hungry planet.
The San Diego-based startup has developed vertically integrated system that produces a plant-based protein ingredient that can replace egg whites, whey and casein in food and beverage applications. They harness the power of the humble but awe-inspiring lemna (free-floating aquatic plants commonly referred to as “duckweed”) for a system that is 100 times more sustainable than soy — and it doesn’t require arable land.
One of 50 finalists for SXSW Pitch 2020, Plantible uses scalable processes and environmentally friendly indoor aqua farms to grow lemna. Then they utilize proprietary extraction technology to create an organic and complete protein that will be the most sustainably produced plant-based protein in the world (50,000 times more protein efficient than beef). These processes all take place in the USA and require no pesticides, hexane, or other toxic chemicals.
See the pitch in Innovative World Technology, 5 pm to 6 pm Saturday, March 14, before a live audience and a panel of expert judges.
Winners in each of the 10 categories will be announced at the Pitch Awards Ceremony, at 6:30 pm Sunday, March 15. SXSW attendees are also invited to Meet the Finalists from 10:30 am to 12:30 pm Monday, March 16. All SXSW Pitch events take place at the Hilton Austin Downtown.
Tony Martens, Co-Founder at Plantible Foods, talked about what he thinks overhyped might mean, why he admires the CEO of Memphis Meats, and why he’d worry about loneliness on Mars.
What is your top goal for your startup for 2020?
Scale up and commercialize our ingredient.
With the exception of Plantible Foods, what tech trend is your team most excited about?
Personalized nutrition.
What is the most overhyped tech trend of 2020?
I don’t believe in overhyped technologies, entrepreneurs have dreams and are believers in their own ideas, however sometimes it doesn’t work out for them. Overhyped might just mean that they have been able convince a lot of people on their perhaps unachievable dream.
If you weren’t working for your startup, what would you be doing?
Most likely I would still be living in Amsterdam and working in commodity trading, though having been involved in the sustainable agriculture space for some years, my focus would be more orientated towards organic and sustainable food ingredients.
Tell us your favorite thing about being based in San Diego.
The climate, hands down. Especially coming from Amsterdam, The Netherlands, its hard to complain about the weather.
What has the startup experience taught you about life?
Be respectful, honest and transparent with people as you never know how much time, effort and energy it cost them to get where they are.
Which living person do you most admire and why?
I recently had the opportunity to meet Uma Valeti, the founder and CEO of Memphis Meats, who has also become an advisor to our company. His humble and grateful personality after all the success he has been able to achieve is very admirable. When he invited me to visit his office and meet with him, he made me feel like he was the guest and that he was feeling special that he was able to meet me — having that skill and personality, is something that I find very impressive.
What do you think is the most overrated virtue?
Obedience
Which talent would you most like to have?
I am a relatively energetic individual and can be distracted rather easily. I would love to have the talent to be patient and be able to remain focused for a long period of time.
What’s your actual super power?
My enthusiasm
What motto or quote do you live by?
Easy decisions, hard life — hard decisions, easy life.
What’s the best advice you’ve ever gotten — or given?
If you can’t share/divide, you also cant multiply.
Tell us about something you love.
I am a huge fan of soccer (aka football). Having been born and raised in Amsterdam, my favorite team was assigned at birth: Ajax, Amsterdam. Since then, I have watched basically every game, whether it was in the stadium, on TV or through the radio. Last year, they reached the semi-final of perhaps the most prestigious tournament in the world while I was in San Diego. I decided not to fly back home and when they were up 2-0 at halftime I was banging my head against the wall asking myself why on earth I didn’t fly back. In the end, Ajax lost and my pain was more or less covered by the fact that I didn’t spend $2000 on a ticket to fly back home.
What do you eat/drink/do when you are low on energy?
Coffee ;)
Tell us about a memorable celebrity encounter.
When travelling through Japan with my mother and my brother, we ran into the rapper The Game on a train station in Hiroshima.
If you were offered the opportunity to colonize Mars (but with no guarantee that you would ever return to Earth), would you go?
It is very hard to answer this question without knowing the dynamic of the group. Loneliness can result in various forms of unhappiness and mental illness, and therefore the excitement of colonizing Mars might soon be overwhelmed by the fact that you are there all alone with little to no communication abilities. Having moved from Amsterdam to Southern California without a social life in place was tough on some days, but at least I was part of a community/society and had the opportunity to establish a social life. Being on Mars by myself, I don’t know to be honest….
Look for more interviews with other finalists in this space between now and the start of SXSW Pitch on Saturday, March 14. Visit this page to see all previous interviews in this series as well as a list of all finalists.
If you are an entrepreneur, check out the SXSW 2020 Startups Track, which runs March 13-17. This track brings together founders and funders and showcases exciting new companies, products, services, and business models across different verticals and industries.
Hugh Forrest serves as Chief Programming Officer at SXSW, the world’s most unique gathering of creative professionals. He also tries to write at least four paragraphs per day on Medium. These posts often cover tech-related trends; other times they focus on books, pop culture, sports and other current events.
