This is an episode of Crisis Meets Opportunity, a podcast I do every Monday WEEKLY with my friend Kai Wang. Enjoy listening about our week, current events, and the insider details on the launch of Sobo Foods! Episode breakdown is generally 2 current events, a business diagnosis and a thoughtful end-of-episode thing about life advice. Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6mCouRehIWU8tQsHqWqvMM Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/crisis-meets-opportunity/id1615486011   ..read more

Today we’re interviewing Karen Chiu, Senior Brand and Business Development Manager at Lypid Food. A foodtech ingredient company that creates Phytofat, a plant-based fat that’s healthier and more sustainable than animal fat. I actually was able to meet Karen before the interview in which she invited me to try the phytofat burger at San Burino. This was a really interesting place in Taipei as it felt like I stepped into an American mini mall. Anyways, we couldn’t do the interview over there so we did it when I was in Kaohsiung online. Karen’s specialty is branding and she actually did a bit of b ..read more

Today we’re interviewing Evelyn Sun, Investment Manager at Foodland Ventures, a VC firm in Taiwan. Ok so now we’re going to see Taiwan’s view on food tech. For those that don’t know, Taiwan is a powerhouse when it comes to innovation. I went to about like, 3 museums per country and one of the most memorable museums I went to was the National Science and Technology Museum in Kaohsiung, the coastal southern city of Taiwan. Oh man, Taiwan smokes everyone when it comes to the thoughtfulness and more importantly, the investments they put into business-to-business play is impressive. 92% of the worl ..read more

Today we’re interviewing Mai Bach, Co-founder and CEO of Oochacha, one of the first vegan restaurants in Taiwan that serve raw smoothies. She’s a social entrepreneur who walks the walk and talks the talk. Mai and her husband/business partner did a 6-month trip around Asia and then settled down in Taiwan to start a vegan business. Sound familiar? Mai is an amazing conversationalist. I didn’t even edit this episode all that much because she just spoke so eloquently and was just full of knowledge. She talks about Taiwan being this small but big city and why she decided to set up shop here. Mai al ..read more

Today we chat with Yuki Hanyu, Founder and CEO of IntegriCulture Inc., a cellular agriculture platform company developing cell-based meat and the technologies needed to produce it efficiently at scale. He is also the Founder of the Shojinmeat Project, a citizen-science nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing an open-source, inclusive future for cellular agriculture. Before starting Integriculture, Yuki started the Shojin Meats, is a project Yuki started that allows you to create cultivated meat from home. Yuki explains the unique process in the episode which I find quite insane. If you h ..read more

Today we’re interviewing Satoshi Umino, founder of Sustainable Foods Asia, a consulting firm that helps companies enter the Japanese market. Satoshi personally works with companies to prop and pop up restaurants and educates consumers about unique food ingredients. I’ve met Satoshi multiple times when I was back in the United States and it’s been real good bumping into him. It seems like a lot of Japanese companies are going to the United States to find the next big innovation. Our manufacturing partner has been courting through Japanese companies through his facility so something’s there. Sat ..read more

Today we’re interviewing Akiko Okada, Research and Insight Specialist at SigmaXYZ. A consulting firm in Japan. Akiko is also the main point of contact for Smart Kitchen Summit Japan, a satellite conference of Michael Wolf’s conference of the same name, Akiko gives us a short history of the innovation of Japan, in which she played a huge part of in her past life. I think this interview also gives me perspective on what exactly is food tech. Whenever I talk about food tech, I generally gravitate to alternative proteins, but that’s not the case. Food Tech is where we apply any technology to food ..read more

Today we’re interviewing Jennifer Stokjovic, author of The Future of Food Is Female, Founder of the Vegan Woman’s Summit, and VC partner at Joyful VC. Jennifer is pretty much everywhere when it comes to food tech and coincidentally enough, she was in South Korea while I was there. But unlike me who was in South Korea goofing off, Jennifer was there advocating for food technology at the World Knowledge forum. Helen told me after her interview that she was in town, I sent a quick text and 4 hours later, I took a Korean taxi to one of the fanciest hotels I’ve ever seen and met Jennifer, where we ..read more

Today we’re interviewing Helen Gi, Founder of HAE Creative, a mission-driven consultant agency that helps a ton of plant-based brands understand South Korea. HAE stands for Human Health Animal Liberation and Environmental Sustainability We do this in a district in Korea called Itaewon! Itaewon is crazy, it’s this unique, sloping melting pot of so many different cultures and vanity. My friend and I found a bar crawl there and we were surprised how many foreigners showed up. Helen is such a helpful and giving person who has great insights on the Korean vegan community and has worked in a variety ..read more

Today we’re interviewing Jimmy Sohn, founder of TechnoPlus, but does a variety of other things to help bring innovative food technologies to Korea. He is described as a one-man-army who has a vast variety of skillsets and understands food really well. I’ve been a linkedin connection with Jimmy for years and it’s so awesome to meet him in person in Korea. Jimmy has been following and contributing to the cultivated meat movement since the beginning. Jimmy has a degree in hotel management and used to manage restaurants and become a chef. Once he moved to Korea, he found out about food tech, speci ..read more