Team:iBowu-China/Entrepreneurship
Based on our soft rot bio-control product, the entrepreneurship team of 2019 iBowu-China focuses on the concept of future farming. Since the environmental crisis is one of the major concerns of the modern world, our team believes that environmentally friendly herbicides and pesticides will be the key to future farming. The entrepreneurship team of iBowu-China analyzes and composes a business plan around the environmental advantages to commercialize this soft rot bio-control product. Compared to other chemical herbicides and pesticides, our product has inestimable potentials on preventing plant diseases that benefit both the environment and the farmer. One of the vital methods, cell-free technology, enables modifications to the product's properties so that the product can solve other agricultural problems. The entrepreneurship team proposes the business plan that covers not only the advantages of the product but also establishes a path to achieve our vision for future farming.
With increasing population and higher food demand, technological development and innovative methods specifically targeted at agriculture become necessary. In response to the mounting demand while cautiously avoiding the abuse of land and natural resources, future farming has to encompass eco-friendly products, sustainable mechanisms, and effective future policies regarding the changing situation of the farming system to produce high quality food, especially staples that sustain the most population. The mission of our product treating bacterial soft rot of potatoes will align with the central ideas of future farming in order to establish a healthy feedback loop among multiple agents: herbicides, farmers, consumers, and the natural environment. Firstly, our product will not discharge environmentally-damaging elements into the soil that functions as the foundation for rotational farming. Secondly, we strive to sustain these farmers by selling herbicides with affordable prices and assist them in generating more profits from the crops. Sustainable development isn’t solely about the soil and environment, to ensure that the farmers are economically sustainable -- reasonable costs and available markets for selling the crops -- is equally significant in maintaining the healthy loop. Finally, we will constantly adjust the details and logistics of our product to accommodate the changing farming system, and we hope that our product can positively impact future policies on agriculture towards sustainable development and will eventually benefit the farmers.
Instead of employing genetically modified bacteria, cell free technology prevents uncontrolled escape of genetically modified organisms into the environment. By physically removing the cell wall, the system guarantees the biological safety of the experiment and implications on real crops. Current solutions for bacterial soft rot do exist, but they are either deleterious to the environment or ineffective to radically treat the disease. For example, Bacillus subtilis and Chloroisobromine cyanuric acid, two of the most common herbicides for bacterial soft rot, have slow effect, short effective period, and are susceptible to the natural environment. Copper hydroxide, another traditional treatment, can even potentially harm the human body and is extremely inefficient. On the other hand, since every component of our product is natural, its potential detrimental impact on the environment will be minimized, hence tremendously outperforming the competitors with an end to develop an eco-friendly cycle between crops and herbicides.
Rather than using the common approaches such as CPR for detection, cell free technology enables testing in remote locations without relying on expensive lab equipment. In addition, when dried and extracted onto testing strips, the system can be utilized by persons who have very little or no knowledge of synthetic biology. The detection process also only takes a few minutes to accomplish, therefore proving its efficiency. The price of the product is affordable to all farmers as one test strip for detection only costs 0.28 USD. If farmers are able to detect the occurrence of potato bacterial soft rot in its early stage and apply the corresponding treatment, they can potentially avoid crop losses and raise their revenues with a larger number of productions.
Bacterial soft rot is one of the most destructive diseases that commonly occurs in crops. It is caused by bacteria Erwinia Carotovora, which secretes enzymes capable of breaking down the cell wall, therefore destroying the tissue structure of the affected crops. The infected areas then become soft, mushy, and dark in color. The decay is more likely to exacerbate when met with high temperature and humidity; hence, soft rot appears more often in the summer (July, August, and September). The disease can be found in fields, in storage, in transit, and during marketing, causing losses that can amount to hundreds and millions of dollars annually. According to a research done by San Diego Academic press, post-harvest bacterial soft rot has accounted for 15-30% of crop losses (Agrios, 2006). Although accurate estimates of monetary losses are not available, the disease may annually cause up to 50 to 1x108 dollars worldwide.
| Region | Crop | Damages |
|---|---|---|
| Japan | Cabbage | Severe damage |
| Kern County, CA | Potato | 30% of the harvested produce is affected |
| Nigeria | Tomato | 25% loss at harvest; 35% loss in transit, storage, and during marketing (~50% of total production) |
Faced with such acute condition, pre-existing herbicides, however, are not sufficient enough to either detect the pathogen in its early phase or effectively eliminate the infectious bacteria. Bacillus subtilis and Chloroisobromine cyanuric acid, two of the most common herbicides for bacterial soft rot, have slow effect, short effective period, and are susceptible to the natural environment. Copper hydroxide, another traditional treatment, is extremely inefficient and can even potentially harm the human body.
Since Erwinia Carotovora is a quorum sensing bacterium, it produces and releases chemical signals (autoinducers/AHL) that serve a variety of regulatory functions, especially reflecting AHL abundance and thus indicating bacteria cell density. With this observation, we approach the problem with two pathways:
1. Detection
2. Prevention and Termination
Below is an illustration of the mechanism of the product:
SWOT stands for “Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats”. The analysis allows our company to foresee benefits and drawbacks when entering into the market, seeking for consulting, and planning out for the patent. First, we illustrate our strengths and weaknesses in a relative comparison with our competitors. These are internal analysis which will assist us to find the optimal position in the market. Then, we perform the external analysis which will help us assess potential risks and benefits of both the development and marketing of the product.
1. We capitalize on cell free technology, which ensures biosafety and prevents uncontrolled escape of genetically modified organisms into the environment, therefore outperforming our competitors
2. Our experiment has proven that the quorum sensing mechanism works effectively
3. The product is accessible to all, especially farmers who have no prior knowledge of synthetic biology
1. Dependence on the effectiveness and efficiency of our cell free system
2. Customers may not accept biosynthesized products, and the farmers usually still rely on traditional herbicides and pesticides
3. The damage of bacterial soft rot is not as severe as other crop diseases such as blight.
1. Currently, the product can only treat potato bacterial soft rot, but since the bacteria Erwinia Carotovora that causes the infection is the same for many other crops, we have an expanding market with huge amount of potential.
2. Other diseases such as blackleg have similar symptoms and are caused by similar bacteria; hence, if we slightly modify our current mechanism in response to different situations, the product can have a greater variety of implications.
1. If climate change and global warming increase the frequency of bacterial soft rot outbreak, then our product will be favored.
Cell free technology enables testing in remote locations without relying on expensive lab equipment. In addition, when dried and extracted onto testing strips, the system can be utilized by persons who have very little or no knowledge of synthetic biology. The detection process also only takes a few minutes to accomplish, therefore proving its efficiency. If farmers are able to detect the occurrence of potato bacterial soft rot in its early stage and apply the corresponding treatment, they can potentially avoid crop losses and raise their revenues provided with a larger number of productions. Most importantly, cell free technology prevents uncontrolled escape of genetically modified organisms into the environment. By physically removing the cell wall, the system guarantees the biological safety of the experiment and implications on real crops. With a central focus on cell free technology, our product in the market has considerable potential and benefits compared to our competitors who utilized chemical or biological products for treatment.
Potential Market represents the percentage of total crop losses due to post harvest bacterial soft rot all over the world. According to the data gathered from Asian Journal of Plant Sciences, about 15 to 30 percent of losses can be avoided if the crops are effectively treated.
Since our current treatment specifically targets at potato soft rot, the Available Market is calculated by the total production of potatoes (388 million tons) times 0.2 (388 * 20% = 77.8) based on the 15-30% crop losses calculation.
We did realize that the 15-30% crop losses due to bacterial soft rot were derived from one field in which conditions like high temperature and high humidity were in presence. However, not every place in the world will undergo conditions like this. We therefore estimate that the Target Market will include approximately 3.8 million tons of potatoes (77.6 * 5% = 3.88) that are actually affected by bacterial soft rot worldwide.
We discovered that since 2000, there was a huge shift of production focus from Northern European countries to Asian countries like China and India; for example, the Chinese government has identified potato as a major crop, aiming to increase potato plantation from 5.9 million hectares in 2014 to 10 million hectares in 2020. Hence, we decided that our market will mainly be in China, India, Northern Europe, and North America, which collectively account for about 50% of the world’s total affected population of bacterial soft rot.
Additionally, considering that many farmers still rely on traditional chemical herbicides, our product may not reach as many farmers as possible. We then estimated that 1 out of 5 farmers (20%) will consider buying our product.
As a result, for the Penetrated Market, we will be able to reach 388,000 tonnes of infected potatoes (3.88 * 50% * 20% = 0.388 million = 388, 000).
As a startup company and to protect the intellectual property rights of our product, we plan to file for a patent which costs 2,000 CNY ($282.95). In order to reduce the cost of equipment, we approach to various companies who can provide us with a lab. By presenting our plans and sharing our passion, we successfully got the sponsorship of iBowu institution. They provided us with some necessary equipment, thus reducing the fee on prototype. Therefore, the overall development fee is approximately 100000 CNY.
The cost of producing one product is 6 CNY (not including labor fee). The ingredients include cell-free product (5 CNY per 5uL), and 0.03 CNY of template, paper template and plasmid. According to the cost of the product and Labor fee which is about 0.05 per product, we set the price of our product to 7CNY, which means that every product can bring about 0.95CNY profit. In addition, according to our experiment, one unit of our product is enough for 10kg potatoes, so we decided to sell our product in a pack of 100 papers which is enough for one-ton potatoes. Summing up the total fee, one pack will cost 700 CNY ($98.92).
Combining the startup and development fee, the total cost will be 102,000 CNY ($14,414). Therefore, we need to sell 146 packs of our product in order to net a positive profit. We estimate this process will cost one month at the beginning.
In response to the potato cycle and the overall growing-selling system, we plan to develop corresponding precautions and treatment for farmers in each stage.
Stage 1: Sprout Development
Stage 2: Vegetative Development
Stage 3: Tuber Initiation
Stage 4: Tuber Bulking
Stage 5: Malturation
Stage 6: Storage
Stage 7: Transportation
Instead of solely concentrating on treating bacterial soft rot, our company wants farmers to be the ultimate beneficiaries from the products and services we provide, therefore supporting the idea of future farming and establishing a healthy feedback loop among multiple agents: herbicides, farmers, consumers, and the natural environment. We strive to sustain these farmers by selling our toolkits with affordable prices and assist them in generating more profits from the crops. Sustainable development isn’t only about the soil and environment; to ensure that the farmers are economically sustainable -- reasonable costs and available markets for selling the crops -- is equally significant to maintain the healthy loop. We will provide the farmers with other valuable resources beside syn-bio-treatment of bacterial soft rot through our online resource center that will be continuously developed by people in our team who have abundant knowledge about green farming.
Innovation is intertwined in every phase of our business. We stress innovation as culture and necessary procedures to promote creativity, entrepreneurial spirit, and new ideas, expressed in economic value. We dare to think and act differently, putting the farmers’ problems in the center of our thinking.
