Winners of Best disruptive food and drink business plan at the YES24 competition

Congratulations to Caffinity Biotech, a team of early-career researchers from the Astbury Centre, on winning "Best disruptive food and drink business plan" sponsored by the Food Consortium Collaborative Training Partnership (CTP) at the YES24 competition.

Your Entrepreneurs Scheme (YES) is a competition that challenges participants to develop innovative solutions to address pressing global challenges. Celebrating its 29th year, YES24 brought together talented individuals to pitch their hypothetical business ideas.

The team took part in the "Food and Drink" category pitch which was held at Campden BRI.  They then took part in the national showcase at the Royal Society in London.  Information on the showcase can be found on the YES website. They said:

"The YES24 competition was a great experience. We had the opportunity to work alongside fantastic teams of scientists, and we learned so much throughout the process. It was rewarding to collaborate and develop our business idea from initial concept to a pitch-ready plan. We gained an understanding of how to share ideas effectively and translate scientific concepts into a viable business proposal. Before YES24, we wouldn't have known where to even begin with a start-up challenge, but now we feel much more confident and equipped to take on real-world entrepreneurial opportunities."

"Our idea addressed the challenge of tasteless, low-quality decaffeinated coffee. Our R&D approach was based on protein design and microbial fermentation to modify caffeine into a non-stimulatory molecule.  Developing this idea and creating a business plan was such an enriching team effort, and both we and several audience members believe it holds significant potential in the food industry."

The team comprised Darcey Ridgway-Brown, Lawrence Collins, Amir Rahmani and Brian Mantilla.