The winning of the jury prize at the recent Women Entrepreneurs 4 Good (WE4G) global startup pitching event in Paris, by South African biotechnology startup BAOM Eco Solutions (BAOM), has created many opportunities for the enterprise, company co-founder and business development lead Chloe Cormack tells Engineering News Online in an exclusive interview. It was also an “amazing” experience. WE4G is an initiative of the Paris-based global Women’s Forum and the pitching event took place as part of the 2023 Women’s Forum Global Meeting. The partners in WE4G are the Bank of America, HEC Paris (France’s, and so one of the world’s, top business school) and leading French corporate law firm Bredin Prat.

“The win of the [WE4G] startup prize is not a monetary win but it means international, indeed global, recognition from very esteemed associations and businesses,” she explains. “It comes with a year of business schooling support from HEC Paris, which brings network connections, including being able to set up appointments with high-level stakeholders of large corporations, and being aware of grants and programmes going on that could support us further, as well as potentially giving us access to HEC experts – if we are having a specific dilemma, we may be able to book legal appointments or business advice appointments or financial advice appointments, with the relevant mentors. And, really, the other thing is the digital and global visibility this gives us, which is a very big thing for a startup business, to be seen and acknowledged by huge corporations.”

Based in Cape Town, BAOM (whose other co-founder, and product development lead, is Melian Dott) has developed cellulose-based alternatives to flexible plastics and other unsustainable packaging materials. The company’s biofilms, as it calls its products, are not merely biodegradable but compostable, allowing end-users to process biofilm packaging themselves by actually burying it in their gardens or compost heaps, thereby helping nourish their plants. Alternatively, they can give the material to their local community garden or dispose of it to for-profit composting companies. The biofilms are, in fact, even edible in some regards, ensuring a safe packaging solution for humans, pets and livestock in case of accidental consumption. This edible quality is a value-add to the packaging solution when working with livestock feed as it can add additional nutrients and immune support to ensure healthy livestock. These biofilms were developed using the company’s own proprietary processes.

The road to winning the WE4G jury prize started with BAOM being one of 800 applicants, from 79 countries. WE4G selected some 200 of these hopefuls, and put them through a 72-hour “business development sprint” over a weekend in May this year. These involved cycles of learning sessions, practical sessions, presentations and then breaks, repeated again and again.

“We basically did three days of high impact sessions,” reports Cormack (stressing the word “high”). “It was such an impressive programme, incredibly fast paced, incredibly productive. It’s almost like they took the golden nuggets from their business education school and just provided it to us in an express format over the weekend, and so we really upskilled dramatically over that weekend. It started Friday afternoon and we ended it very late on Sunday night, and so it was an amazing but very tiring experience.”

Following this, the ten finalist Laureates were chosen. They then went through a three-month programme which gave them access to mentors and occasional lectures, before being brought to Paris for the final pitching event, which formed part of the 2023 Women’s Forum Global Meeting event. “There were so many impressive inspiring women, from all sorts of fields and businesses, market streams and different positions within companies, that have different kinds of pull,” she highlights. “We met so many political activists and politicians, brilliantly inspiring entrepreneurs and so many business CEOs and professionals; it was just incredible! We made a lot of collaboration networking contacts.”

She reports that one of the jury members commended BAOM, saying “WOW! I am honestly impressed,” in front of the audience after their presentation, and then approached them, prior to the announcement of them winning the prize, about him potentially investing in BAOM. “So, if all goes well, we may have an investor,” she observes. “But no finances have opened officially, yet, to us, but we are open to all sorts, particularly grants and other non-dilutive funding if possible.”

BAOM has just obtained factory production space and a macrolab. All being well, the startup will next year “onboard” some scientists, other employees and interns, and start production in preparation to sell its products. It already has a significant waiting list of clients.  

“We’re very excited to have met everybody in Paris, everybody was so supportive,” enthused Cormack. “I mean, there were the most incredible companies, and women running these companies and these startups, with the most impressive and innovative ideas of bringing peace, health and prosperity to the world, to the people, to the planet.”