FOOD AND BEVERAGE TRAILBLAZERS PODCAST EPISODE 6

PODCAST: Phuture Foods’ founder on Singapore plant-based pork launch, response from Muslim consumers, and scientific expertise

03-Apr-2020 - Last updated on 19-Aug-2020 at 07:51 GMT

In this episode of our Food and Beverage Trailblazers podcast, we speak to Lim Jin Yin, the COO and co-founder of Malaysia-based plant-based meat start-up Phuture Foods.

Related tags F&B Trailblazers plant-based meat Pork

In this episode of our Food and Beverage Trailblazers podcast, we speak to Lim Jin Yin, the COO and co-founder of Malaysian plant-based pork start-up Phuture Foods about its imminent launch in Singapore, the initial response its product has received from Muslim consumers, plus how his engineering background has helped him in his F&B entrepreneurship journey.

Phuture Foods is one of the first plant-based meat companies coming out of Malaysia. So far, it is very much focused on pork as its first product and will be launching this in Singapore later this month on April 8.

Its pork mince has been dubbed Phuture Minced, and is made of a combination of different plant-based proteins including non-GMO soy, chickpeas and rice protein.

“The plant-based pork space is very much unchartered territory,” Jin told FoodNavigator-Asia.

“Technically speaking, if you look at Phuture Mince, it is 100% plant-based so if broken down to the ingredient level, consuming this is essentially the equivalent of consuming a plant product. So I would say that it is suitable for almost everyone who eats plants on a daily basis.

“Phuture Foods has gotten some traction in the Muslim community as well, and so far reactions have been 50-50 – some are quite interested to try it, but some still feel Phuture Mince is not in line with their beliefs.”

That said, the Chinese market is still Phuture Foods’ main target for now, and Jin is leading the charge in Singapore.

Previously Jin was a mechanical engineer designing systems for building, a very significantly different career from F&B entrepreneurship. But he said that his past experiences have also served to help him in this new direction.

“The learning curve was actually very steep initially, even more so as a start-up. Previously I was dealing with a lot of machinery and hardware, things that would affect one’s environment, but now it’s about things that go into one’s body,” he said.

“That said, I picked up skills there such as people management and being more analytical when it comes to solving problems – and there are a lot of unforeseen problems to solve every day when running a start-up.

Listen to the podcast above to find out more.