Global dairy giant Chobani is opening applications for four early-stage food startups which will be the first to use new facilities at Melbourne's Monash University.
This week, the yoghurt company's billionaire CEO and founder Hamdi Ulukaya launched the program at the unveiling of the new $3.1 million Monash Food Incubator, which has been created to help food entrepreneurs break into the industry.
Chobani is considered a disruptor in the category, as it has become the most popular yoghurt brand in the US in just 12 years in business.
The new Incubator is part of Monash’s Food Innovation Centre whose aim is to accelerate innovation in Australia’s food industry by providing companies – from start-ups to large corporates – with technological innovation, product development services and research capabilities, to help them export more rapidly into target markets including Asia.
The Chobani startups will receive $10,000 grants and will be the first to use Monash University's new incubation facility, which is located at its Food Innovation Centre in Melbourne.
The facility includes a collaboration space, food kitchen incubator, and complementary food lab, with Chobani's four early-stage food startups the first to make use of the space.
Chobani's Ulukaya (below) said there was "never been a better time to be a food entrepreneur, in Australia or around the world".
"Natural food start-ups with the right mindset can change categories, challenge the big guys and make a big difference in their communities," he said.
"I love what’s happening with food start-ups here in Australia and want to share we've learned when it comes to scaling and fighting convention, like we’ve done with our other incubator programs.
"This is a no-strings-attached, grant-based program to support entrepreneurs so we can further fuel the food revolution.”
Monash director of food and agriculture Professor Nicolas Georges said that while there are other food incubators around the world, the end-to-end support systems available through Monash’s cross-disciplinary scale of research expertise and research infrastructure was unique.
“We know nine out of 10 new food products in the FMCG segment fail,” he said.
“By using Monash facilities and expertise, businesses can triple or quadruple their likely success rate and, at the very least, avoid expensive mistakes by identifying problems earlier rather than later,” he said.
The $3 million Incubator was co-designed by Monash stakeholders and external partners including Mariljohn and DesignInc.
It anchors the start-up support expertise of partners Rocket Seeder, My Other Kitchen, NEIS Holmesglen, Badalya and Monash’s Food Innovation Centre.
Monash's vision is to build a community of food creators in a world-class facility; support food entrepreneurs in bringing their ideas to life; and co-create the future of food, according to Georges.
