Team:KU LEUVEN/Entrepreneurship
Entrepreneurship
Introduction
From the start, our team was determined to ensure that our research can have an impact outside the lab and possibly benefit society. We decided we wanted to find a tangible value of a hypothetical product by developing a detailed plan on the steps of going from lab to market. Our team developed a TRIZ-matrix, a problem-solving analysis that provided us with the necessary solutions to our project related problems. Setting up this matrix allowed us to come up with relevant solutions and helped us in determining our business strategy. We ultimately summarized this strategy in a business model canvas.
To accurately determine the viability and feasibility of a start-up scenario, we wrote an extensive business model using the business scaffold, made in collaboration with the iGEM team of UNSW Australia. In this model, we describe the structure of our business, conduct an extensive market analysis of the enzym market. Finally, we execute a financial report on enzyme production costs and revenues of a theoretical industrial plant using cyanobacteria.
TRIZ Matrix
The TRIZ matrix is a readily used tool by businesses and startups. The basic principle behind this tool is to find already existing solutions to similar problems. In order to use the matrix, a contradiction is made between a feature that must be improved and a feature that must be preserved; these are taken from a list of 39 available parameters. We used a few of these contradictory statements to solve the current problems facing our project. The website of TRIZ40 was consulted for the statements [1].
The Business Model Canvas
Key Partners
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Key Activities
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Value OCYANO, a value-driven company, offers a low-input platform for carbon negative protein production that contains technologies to tackle the bottlenecks of cyanobacteria, namely the slow growth and protein secretion, when used for mass production |
Customer Relationships
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Target Group
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Key Resources
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Channels
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Cost Structure
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Revenue Streams
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Business Plan
Financial Analysis
Financial analysis
In the previously outlined business plan, we hypothesize starting a company. A financial analysis is a helpful addition to
a business plan as it gives us an overview of the risks and rewards associated with scale-up. Due to corporate confidentiality,
however, we were not able to estimate revenues in a realistic manner. Nevertheless, we were able to examine the costs, splitting
up the analysis in the engineering phase and the production phase.
Engineering phase
The engineering phase is the first phase towards a large-scale industrial production line. Firstly, the set-up
of the required growth conditions for the cyanobacterial culture needs to be set. To achieve optimal growth
conditions, the purchase of a CO2 incubator and approximately 3L of BG-11 medium is required. Once the right
conditions are established, Synechoccous elongatus UTEX 2973 can be purchased, followed by the construction
of the recombinant plasmid. The necessary expenses for this construction are a commercial plasmid backbone, the
synthetic DNA insert of the protein of interest, oligo NT primers, and the Gibson Assembly master mix. Specific
plasmids and One Shot TOP10 E. Coli have to be subsequently purchased. According to our calculations, the expenses
for this phase will be approximately $7,906.08 (Table 1).
| Engineering phase | ||
| Description | Costs | Company |
| Backbone plasmid | $109.21 | Addgene |
| Primers | $22.39 | IDT |
| Synthetic DNA ($88 for 251-500 bp) | $88.04 | IDT |
| Gibson assembly master mix | $187.23 | BIOKÉ |
| Plasmids (conjugation) | $131.09 | Addgene |
| One Shot TOP10 electrocompetent E. Coli | $343.26 | Thermo Fisher |
| Cyanobacteria (UTEX 2973) | $186.19 | UTEX |
| CO2 incubator | $6,352.54 | Eppendorf |
| BG11 Medium ($81z/500mL; 3L) | $486.14 | Sigma-Aldrich |
| Total | $7,906.08 | |
Production Phase
The production phase can start once the recombinant cyanobacteria strain is established. Starting at small scale
production (laboratory fermenter, 50L), production can be increased to ‘pilot scale’ (10m3) and afterwards to ‘plant scale’
(500m3). The costs associated with each of these production scales are estimated to be respectively: $195 000, $1.9 million
and $83 million (Table 2-4). These costs include the rent of industrial space, constructing a closed photobioreactor, the
required amount of BG-11 medium and staff salaries. A significant decrease in costs can be achieved by creating own BG-11 medium instead of commercially purchasing ready-made medium.
| Production phase 1: Laboratory fermenter (50L) | ||
| Description | Costs | |
| Fixed costs | Manufacturing space ($6/m2; 100m2) | $575.07 |
| Closed photobioreactor ($50-150/m2) | Further development of industrial design needed | |
| Variable costs | BG11 Medium ($81/500mL, 50L) | $8,102.27 |
| Staff salaries ($3900/month; 12 months, 4 employees) | $187,200.00 | |
| Total | $195,877.34 | |
| Production phase 2: Pilot scale (10m3) | ||
| Description | Costs | |
| Fixed costs | Manufacturing space ($6/m2; 500m2) | $2,875.36 |
| Closed photobioreactor ($50-150/m2) | Further development of industrial design needed | |
| Variable costs | BG11 Medium ($81/500mL, 10 000L) | $1,620,453.92 |
| Staff salaries ($3900/month; 12 months, 5 employees) | $234,040.80 | |
| Total | $1,857,370.08 | |
| Production phase 3: Plant scale (500m3) | ||
| Description | Costs | |
| Fixed costs | Manufacturing space ($6/m2; 5000m2) | $28,753.58 |
| Closed photobioreactor ($50-150/m2) | Further development of industrial design needed | |
| Variable costs | BG11 Medium ($81/500mL, 500 000L) | $81,022,696.00 |
| Staff salaries ($3900/month; 24 months, 20 employees) | $1,872,326.40 | |
| Total | $82,923,775.98 | |