17 February 2015

Idea to biomolecule company wins Venture Cup

Biotechnology

A business plan for how to radically reduce the production costs of biomolecules in both food processing and pharmaceutical industries won the Cleantech & Environment category at Venture Cup's Idea Competition 2015. The idea behind the business plan is provided by Associate Professor Hussam Nour-Eldin from DynaMo Center, PLEN, University of Copenhagen.

In their search for an idea for Venture Cup's Idea Competition, the prize winning team got into contact with DynaMo member Hussam Nour-Eldin. Hussam Nour-Eldin’s research is focused on how biomolecules are transported within plants and after resent very promising results, he has the vision to one day create a spinoff company based on his research.

Young biotech entrepreneurs

The winning team consists of master students from CBS’ BioBusiness and Innovation Platform and Georgia Institute of Technology. The Danish-American cooperation developed Hussam Nour-Eldin’s idea into an actual business plan for a company which they named Charon Biotech.

In the proposal, Charon Biotech applies a novel biotechnology that can retrieve biomolecules from biological factories. With this new technology Charon Biotech wants to increase yield and reduce production costs of biomolecules.

- The winning team demonstrated great technological hope and, if applied, it may radically reduce costs of biomolecules in both the food processing and the pharmaceutical industry, said Venture Cup jury member Frederik Flagsted, COO of the company GreenGo Energy.

The Venture Cup's Idea Competition is over and the well earned first prize in house, but Hussam Nour-Eldin is optimistic about one day founding a company based on his idea.