Cork will play host to one of the world's first aquaculture startup accelerators
The ‘niche’ Hatch programme is looking for sustainable and innovative ideas in Ireland.
AN ACCELERATOR PROGRAMME for aquaculture startups is setting up its next base in Cork to find new technology that will make fisheries and other marine businesses more sustainable.
The Hatch accelerator, which will take place at UCC, provides support to startups that are working in areas like better nutrition or making fish farms more efficient.
It is expected to take in eight startups and run from September to December, linking participants to aquaculture- and marine-specific investors and research partners.
Hatch was co-founded by Cork man Wayne Murphy and a team from German aquaculture venture capital firm Alimentos Ventures. It ran its inaugural programme in Norway earlier this year.
Murphy has also served as a mentor for RebelBio, a life sciences startup programme that recently left Cork. According to the organisers, Hatch is the first accelerator programme for the “niche” aquaculture space.
Startup accelerators are very common in technology and life sciences and the Hatch programme takes many of its cues from these established players, providing mentors and investor pitching support.
Wayne Murphy
The Norwegian edition of the programme wrapped up in Bergen in June. The cohort included a startup developing lab-grown fish and another that creates digital management tools for fish farms.
Georg Baunach, one of Hatch’s co-founders, said the connection to Cork via Murphy helped in getting the wheels in motion and finding mentors for the Irish edition of the accelerator.
The seafood industry is a major part of Norway’s economy – the Scandinavian country is the world’s second-largest seafood exporter – but Baunach believes the same programme can be replicated in Cork.
“Ireland is obviously not as large as Norway, for example in salmon farming, but it still farms salmon and has a distinctive brand around it in terms of eco-friendly salmon,” he said.
“For us, it’s also access to talent for those startups. If a tech company in Norway is trying to look for people to hire for their tech development, that’s a very difficult task – and expensive. I think, in Ireland, we have a better base for that.”
‘A great position’
Baunach pointed to the growing number of major corporate players that had turned their attention to the aquaculture industry as a sign of the growth opportunities in the sector.
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For example, pharma giant Merck has been developing products for marine health, while US agriculture giant Cargill – one of Hatch’s sponsors – acquired Norwegian salmon feed firm EWOS in 2015 for €1.3 billion.
Hatch will take on startups that are at the seed or pre-seed stages and have a basic proof-of-concept in tow. It will invest in the companies that show the most promise in return for a small equity stake.
Much of Hatch’s team are from the investment firm Alimentos Ventures, which previously backed Cork-based MicroSynbiotiX. The startup, which is developing alternatives to antibiotics for fish, closed a €1 million funding round last year.
Baunach said Hatch invested via a convertible loan note that typically converted into a shareholding.
“We are not the type of accelerator that gets hundreds of applications, so we can be quite specific in what we’re looking for,” he said.
“If I see a cod-farming startup, I can directly reach out and say to companies out there that we’re interested in having a company like this in the programme.”
