Dr Viknish Krishnan-Kutty, founder and CEO of Cellivate Technologies, emerged as the biggest winner of CNA’s business reality show The Big Spark when he walked away with a whopping S$4.15 million in potential funding from five venture capitalists (VC).

Only five teams out of the initial 24 made it to the final of The Big Spark after two rounds of competitions. Three out of the final five received funding from investors.

Antler, a Singapore-based VC, provided Cellivate Technologies with the biggest injection of funds with its offer of S$500,000. Three other VCs each dished out $100,000 in support of the start-up, which offers plant-based and cell-based solutions that replace the slaughter of animals.

The final VC to make an offer was Sebastian Togelang of Rigel-Farro Capital. Sebastian initially offered just S$50,000, but quickly drew cheers from the crowd when he followed up with another offer to fund Cellivate Technologies’ S$3.3 million seed round.

Founded in 2019 as spin-off from the National University of Singapore, Cellivate Technologies is the first entrepreneurial undertaking by Dr Viknish, who had taken a leap of faith when he ditched his stable job as a research scientist at the National University of Singapore (NUS) to pursue his passion for ethical meat consumption.

Dr Viknish, who has not consumed meat since his teenage days when he first learned about the problems created from the rearing of livestock, received praise from several VCs after a sharp and confident presentation. He was only seeking to raise S$350,000 in funds in exchange for a 2.5 per cent stake in his company on The Big Spark.

Though Cellivate Technologies has yet to become profitable, investors were clearly encouraged by the fact that the start-up has a large backlog of orders that need to be fulfilled.

Dr Viknish said the funds raised from the competition will be crucial to expanding research and development as well as production capabilities and hiring a dedicated commercial team to grow the business.

“This experience of being on the show has been incredible,” he said. “The company’s funding situation was very bad last year. Our team has been bootstrapping and we were so close to giving up on what we are doing. Winning The Big Spark has shown us that we are on the right track. The funds will also allow us to continue our work and take it to the next level.”

A GAME-CHANGING EXPERIENCE

The other two teams to walk away from the final with funding were both from Indonesia.

Tenang AI, which leverages artificial intelligence to help bridge the mental health gap in Indonesia, was seeking S$1 million in exchange for 20 per cent equity in the company. It raised a total of $300,000 from five VCs.

Sebastian, who made an offer of S$50,000, also offered to connect the founders, Andre Huang and Salma Dias Sarawati, to human resource companies.

“Securing funding on the show has provided us with the necessary resources to bring Tenang AI to more Gen Z users in Indonesia. We can now extend our runway expand the team and make our product even better,” said Salma.

“The Big Spark has been a gamechanger for us.”

ArkoPay, which provides funding to small and medium-sized construction enterprises in Indonesia, received a total of S$405,000. Its founders Laura Lukito and Asri Anjarsari were seeking S$500,000 in exchange for a 15 per cent share of the company.

“Taking part in The Big Spark has given us huge exposure around the world and we’ve even gotten inquiries from potential clients in places as far as the United Arab Emirates. The show has certainly opened many doors and allowed us to meet more potential clients, investors and business partners,” quipped Laura.

“But we’re not quite ready to go global yet,” she added. “For now, we’ll focus on using the funds from the show to scale our business and develop our tech platform further.”

SOLID LEADS

While the other two Singaporean start-ups in the final - Pharlyfe+ and Snap Robotics - did not receive any funding from the VCs, they did end the competition with leads that could help drive their business.

Murli Ravi of Tin Men Capital, for example, offered to speak to Snap Robotics founder Saikrishna Dontu after the show and discuss ways in which the start-up could develop further.

Sebastian and Jussi Salovaara of Antler also offered to provide help to Pharlyfe+ after the show.

Two teams that did not make it to the final also managed to walk away with something to shout about following the exposure they got from the show.

Fintech start-up Bixie, for example, was conferred the Financial Inclusion Award by UOB and has been selected alongside a handful of other companies to promote financial inclusion across Asia with the Asian Development Bank.

Meanwhile, food tech and e-commerce start-up Farmio took home the Changemakers Award by Hatch and has since the conclusion of the show onboarded more than 100 new paying customers.

“We would recommend entrepreneurs in Southeast Asia to participate in The Big Spark,” said Farmio co-founder Paco Chan.

“Here, you’ll be able to make many good friends, meet good mentors and gain access to a lot of good resources.”