Genius Foods

Processed foods play a vital role in making nutrition affordable, asequible and sustainable for everyone. However to date processed foods are packed with fats, sodium and sugars that are affecting human health. The problem is, processed food ingredients come mostly from 8 crops and nutritious ingredients come at an extra cost. 

Genius Foods is a natural, clean label, nutritious and sustainable food ingredients manufacturing company. We developed our technologies e.g. A dehydration process where we keep more than 96% of nutrients in whatever we dehydrate. Our gentle and sustainable extraction processes was designed keep nutrients in our ingredients. 

We then research agricultural byproducts such as fruit and vegetables seeds and peels, undervalued crops and "too ugly, too small crops" so we can provide farmers more income and produce: Food fibers, vegetable proteins and natural colors & flavors so they can be used to formulate affordable and nutritious processed foods.

The main problem Genius Foods is solving is the lack of affordable, nutritious and sustainable food ingredients that can be used to formulate nutritious, affordable and sustainable processed foods. According to WHO the excess of fats, sodium and sugars in processed foods are one of the main causes of obesity and overweight globally. We are changing that by giving access to food manufacturers to food ingredients that are: (1) nutrient dense, (2) affordable and (3) sustainable so they can improve processed foods formulations and make process foods an ally in fighting food security and ill nutrition.

To date 80% of food ingredients come from only 5 crops: rice, potato, soy, maize and wheat. 

We saw 2 big opportunities: (1) 50% of fruits and vegetable produce gets wasted. (2) There are 4,000 plant species that are used in agriculture today and are not used in processed foods formulations.

Genius Foods
Was founded in 2014. Our purpose is to improve nutrition & sustainability in processed foods. Genius Foods Is a privately held food tech company that manufactures and sells clean label, plant based and natural ingredients. We’ve developed patented processing technologies and supply chain logistics that gives us a competitive edge in producing and distributing: (1) Natural flavors (2) Natural Colors (3) Functional Fibers (4) Vegetable protein concentrates.

Sourcing
We source our raw materials from agroindustrial byproducts, such as seeds and peels normally discarded from fruit and vegetable processing, “too ugly” and “too small” fruits and vegetables sourced directly from producers and undervalued crops, which are, crops that their nutritional and functional properties are much higher than their economic value.

By sourcing sustainably we asure that small producers receive extra income for their produce.

Technologies & processes
With our proprietary dehydration process we keep more than 96% of antioxidants and volatile compounds in our powders. For this reason our natural colors have more pigments and our natural flavors have more flavor. For our functional fibers we only apply physical processes to improve functionality so we can substitute ingredients like fats and oils for fiber. Our fibers sustainable and clean label.

We are a B2B company. We sell our ingredients directly to food manufacturers. With our ingredients food manufacturers can substitute synthetic/chemical ingredients and ingredients like fats, oils, sugars, animal proteins for natural, clean label and plant based ingredients. Our business model is to export our ingredients, right now we sell in Mexico and USA but we have inquiries from more than 10 countries that we are attending.

Example:

One of our clients in USA changed a beverage solution with synthetic flavors and colors for one of our ingredients which is, Hibiscus extract powder. They use it for a Hibiscus beverage that they sell ready to drink in more than 300 retail stores. With this ingredient our client offers a natural cost effective beverage to consumers and this product gets to more than 60,000 consumers monthly.

What we do to understand our clients needs is to work directly with them and develop in house applications for our ingredients. For example how you can substitute egg powder or fats in a bakery product o how you can add more fiber to a nutrition bar and improve its texture. 

Our ingredients are now in more than 10 food products.

Genius Foods solution is developing food ingredients that are sustainable, nutritious, plant based and affordable that come from agricultural byproducts and undervalued crops to make processed food more nutrient dense and diverse so it can be beneficial to human health. With our solution we are providing more income to agricultural producers, giving more value to alternate crops, getting nutrient dense ingredients from raw materials that would otherwise ended up in landfills and using these ingredients as tools to include more nutrients and diverse ingredients in processed foods that are part of our daily diet.

Our combination of sourcing and Processing technologies

Our Sourcing

We source our raw materials from agroindustrial byproducts, such as seeds and peels normally discarded, “too ugly” and “too small” fruits and vegetables sourced directly from producers and undervalued crops.

We work with mango seeds and peels, Mexican Hawthorn, Avocado, Tropical fruits  and heirloom Mexican bean varieties. Most of these raw materials are only found in Mexico or Mexico is a top producer country.

Technologies & processes

With our proprietary dehydration process we manage to keep more than 96% of antioxidants and volatile compounds in our powders. For this reason our natural colors have more pigments and our natural flavors have more flavor. 

For our functional fibers we integrated a combination of physical processes with low water usage to improve water holding capacity, emulsion properties and texture properties making our fibers sustainable and clean label. 

We don't use any solvents in our color or flavor extractions rather we use juices or cold water extractions.  

Competitors: 

Fiberstar: Citrus pulp fiber. By using Mexican Hawthorn we gain different functionalities plus better production cost.

Diana Foods: Natural color from juices. Our dehydration tech gives us a yield advantage.

Sourcing

We focus in researching raw materials that are only found in Mexico or Mexico is a top producer, like Mexican Hawthorn o Mango, where Mexico is the 5th largest producer worldwide. By sourcing agricultural byproducts such as seed and peels and undervalued crops we make sure that the material we work with have unique macro/micro nutrients that combined with our technologies will give us a differentiated ingredient to export worldwide. 

Technology

For our dehydration technology we use Infrared at different wave lengths light to target directly to the water in the material without affecting the material itself. This also help us to achieve very low levels of any microorganism because they don't resist the process conditions; this results are comparable to irradiation sterilization processes. This is important because we not only keep nutrients, flavors and colors but also our end products comply with every food safety regulation in the world.

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Interviews with our clients (food manufacturers) gave us insight into what they were looking in new ingredients: (1) nutrition, (2) functionality, (3) Sustainability/shared value (4) cost effectiveness.

On the other hand working with our suppliers, which are farmers and fruit&vegetable processing plants, gave us the following insights: (1) farmers don't try hard to sell 2nd and 3rd quality crops when prices are low because the effort is hard and reward is low, they prefer to let the crop rot in field. (2) Processors are too busy with their existing business that they prefer to give their byproducts to whoever pays a price. 

Consumers are now more conscious than ever in eating more nutrition with ingredients they can relate to. According to WHO our fiber consumption is in average only 50% of the daily recommended dosage.

Working with farmers in paying for their 2nd and 3rd quality crops will provide them with more income and working with processors to get their byproducts at a price will make them give us high quality byproducts. With these, we are getting sustainable sources and nutritious raw materials that come at an affordable cost for us to transform them to ingredients. 

When we process them we make the fibers gain functionality and we concentrate pigments and flavors into powders. Our ingredients are consumer relatable and nutrient dense in fiber, antioxidants and other micro nutrients.

Because of our logistics and processes we give our clients what they look for in new ingredients and we give consumers nutrient dense and relatable ingredients.

Number of people serving today annually: 900,000

Number of people serving in one year annual projection: 2,700,000

Number of people serving in five years annual projection: 20,000,000

We create impact by providing affordable and sustainable nutrition by the means of processed food. By transforming how commercially available products are created, by changing them from within with our ingredients, we are able to reach a larger audience with more nutritious products.

We are currently providing manufacturers in the northern part of Mexico and southern US, affecting more than 10 retail and food service products. By next year, we are introducing our ingredients to at least 200 of these products in the whole US and Mexico territories. In order to achieve that goal, we are partnering with B2B marketplace platforms that connect us to the right manufacturers. We are pushing boundaries to be opening market in Europe and Asia in the following 5 years by targeting our potential buyers through specialized industry gatherings. In order to increase awareness of the sustainability, nutrition and affordability of the products of our technology, we are participating in industry related contests.

We are focused on diminishing the amount of produce that goes to waste by giving that product a second life in the form of food ingredients. Currently, we are working with farmers around Mexico, specially in the Veracruz and Michoacán regions, to locate the right producers for our raw materials. By next year, we are fully integrating with the avocado and mango industries diminishing their waste by up to 100 tons per month. Over the next five years, we will replicate that integration model with fruits like banana, tomato, pineapple and apple.

We had, as many other industries, a major setback with the spread of COVID-19. In the food industry, B2B sales occur mostly by encounters with buyers in major food-related events, such as expos; most of those got cancelled due to health hazards. Most processes are long and tedious, involving trying out formulation after formulation before even placing an order; the virus came to make that process even slower. Not only that, but the lack of expos also eliminated potential prize contests that could have raise awareness about our products and our technology.

On the other hand, farmers with the resources that we need to process our ingredients are hard to come by in Mexico; normally they are only reachable by contacts in common or agricultural structures. 

Another possible barrier are the existing regulations on each new market we export our products to; they tend to be different in terms of how products must be labelled, which processes are accepted and which aren't. Regulations tend to change according to market and national regulations, and must always be tend to with celerity.

We are successfully eliminating the B2B prospecting barriers with the use of specialized B2B marketplace platforms. COVID-19 has showed us that the industry will need to reinvent itself in terms of how it conducts its business and, as a consequence it will be more open to online trading. We are currently working on creating a stronger presence online that will help us capitalize those changes in the behavior of buyers. 

We are working our supply chain logistics to better locate farmers with produce that goes to waste and supplying them with the alternative of letting us create products with it. We are partnering with government and commerce chambers to create a directory that will allow us to map the opportunities. We plan to replicate this approach state by state. We are also currently working on "putting our technology in wheels" so that the processing equipment could be moved closer to agricultural lands in order to assess the needs of the farmers when they need it. 

FInally, we are partnering with legal help that help us assess the regulatory landscape of food legislation in each country we intend to export to.

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We are currently a team of 8 people.

Enrique González / CEO

Enrique has always been involved in the food industry. He majored in Economics and obtained a certification in High Management in the Food Industry from IPADE. He has experience founding food manufacturing businesses, where he directed product innovation and commercialization of retail products with large retailers. He has experience in organizing large groups and negotiation. In Genius Foods, he became the spearhead of the commercial operations of the business and oversees the correct functioning and funding of the company. He has received awards such as MIT Under 35 Mexico edition. 

Flavio Siller / COO 

Flavio is mainly focused on sustainability. He majored in Biotechnology and received a MSc in Bioengineering from KAUST. He has participated in research programs for ITESM, KAUST and iGEM. He focused on using waste materials to create value-added products such as fine chemicals, biofuels and ingredients. He runs the manufacturing and R&D operations in Genius Foods. He has received multiple scholarships for research from ITESM, KAUST and CONACYT.

The Genius Foods team forms part of the Singularity University and Unreasonable Institute networks (he participated in acceleration programs with both organizations). The team has been awarded with multiple recognitions such as being finalists of contests such as IADB Finding Solutions 2014, Hello Tomorrow 2016, Cleantech Challenge 2016, among others.

Genius Foods has formed an Advisory Board with members from its funding partners and industry specialists that helps the executive team asses strategic decisions about the company.

Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey (ITESM) - Campus Monterrey

We have open access to their research facilities and collaborate in research inquiries about the development of food ingredients and their functional and chemical characterization.

Genius Foods is on a quest to make all food products nutritious, sustainable and affordable to everybody. We are a food ingredients company that develops and manufacture specialty food ingredients sourced from alternative sources and fruit and vegetable processing byproducts. We operate as a B2B model, supplying nutritious and clean label food ingredients to food manufacturers. 

We have three main product lines: (1) natural colors and flavors, (2) functional fibers and (3) plant proteins. We source our raw materials from farmers and food processors, transforming their crops and byproducts into specialty food ingredients. We are constantly innovating our processing technologies, so we invest in R&D to find new ways of manufacturing ingredients out of more alternative raw materials. 

We are currently living the disruption of B2B sales. Operations that used to be completed normally peer-to-peer are now being rendered completely online. We are witnessing the rise of marketplace platforms and AI tools for lead generation for B2B operations. We believe MIT Solve's network could connect us to important partners that could help us take advantage of the changes that the industry is sustaining. 

Connectedness is a quality that we value from MIT Solve. When people is aligned into solving great world needs, solutions start to brach among themselves and the sum is bigger that each individual part. We believe that network can help us make a difference for more farmers and food producers, in order to make our mission of sustainable, affordable and nutritious food a reality.

We are also confident that Solve's network can help us better connect with the legal help that could help us thrive in a more connected world, understanding the nuances of each country regulations. 

We are currently moving into a commercialization focused stage of our business, and product supply chain is a major obstacle to tackle. We need to better locate farmers that could supply us with raw materials. We need to better locate buyers that want to change the food products they manufacture for the better. We expect Solve to help us drive our mission of nutrition, sustainability and affordability of food for everybody by helping us reach more people.

On the other hand, reaching more people involves more legal liability; we are sure we can cope with that together.

We have no clear candidates at the moment, however we are very clear about the areas we need support. We would appreciate the awareness Solve is giving to us so that we could find the correct partners thank to that.

We are seriously driven by our mission: to make nutritious, sustainable and affordable food products for everybody. Our solution involves manufacturing agricultural byproducts and undervalued crops to turn them into nutrient dense, sustainable and plant based food ingredient; this approach is highly scalable as any alternate crop or byproduct can be turned into a food ingredient or as we see it into a tool for improving nutrition and food safety.

We are helping food brands create products that will directly impact positively in people health. Our approach is very scalable as we impact through improving our costumer's food products which are products that people eat every day.