KOCHI: Coming up with scientific solutions to burning problems in society is what three women researchers-turned-entrepreneurs are working at. Their transition from students, then into researchers and finally to entrepreneurs began in 2017 and got a firm base in 2021. This was the year when their startup Biovent Innovations Pvt Ltd was registered under Kerala Startup Mission.
The startup is incubated under the Kerala University Business Innovation and Incubation Centre (KUBIIC) and functions outside of the Department of Biotechnology in Kerala University’s Kariavattom campus.
There are many shining points associated with the startup. “We are a venture that was founded and is being run by women,” says Dr Dhanyalekshmi C S, co-founder of Biovent. Another star point is that they are into the research and development of pigments out of biowastes.
“Our main focus is on developing value-added products from wastes and plant-based natural products. And we have become successful in developing a red pigment which can be used as a food colouring agent or in textiles,” says Dhanyalekshmi. The other two women (also co-founders) are Dr Shirly K Thomas and Dr Roshin Elizabeth George.
Explaining more about the product, which has crossed the research stage and is inching towards the reactor level, she says, “In the impure form the pigment is safe to be used in the pastries and other food products. We are also planning to push our product in the textile industry. However, once purified, we obtain prodigiosin which can be used in the treatment of around 50 types of cancer,” she adds.
The startup also undertakes live industrial projects, and high-quality academic project works and also provides hands-on training in various instruments by organising seminars and workshops, contract research services like water and food quality analysis and income-generating projects for ladies in rural areas.
The founders highlight the pluses of being incubated in a campus incubation centre.
“The infrastructure and instrumentation facilities at the university, highly experienced teachers and eminent scientists from various departments and easy reachability for customers are our strength,” say the founders.
Explaining more about the startup, Dhanyalekshmi says, “We have three wings, namely the academic project wing, service wing and the product development wing.”
The startup, which was bootstrapped initially, guides BSc, MSc, BTech, MTech and all applied science students, holds workshops for students, teachers and researchers along with organising startup training programmes.
“Such programmes are dealt with by our academic wing. The product development wing purely focusses on research and developing products like pigments, nutraceuticals, enzymes, bio fertilisers and other innovative products beneficial to society,” say the founders. The researchers have developed products like mushroom nutrivita, NPK fertiliser block and pigments.
“Currently, we are concentrating on developing the red pigment. It takes a lot of time and energy to develop a single pigment. We hope to bring it to the market in two years,” says Dhanyalekshmi, adding that once the product is ready , they might go in for technology transfer rather than developing the dyes by themselves and selling.