SMU Startups Emerge As Game Changers With Plastic Recycling Initiatives
SMU Startups Emerge As Game Changers With Plastic Recycling Initiatives
By SMU City Perspectives team
Published
Two startups from Singapore Management University’s (SMU) Business Innovations Generator (BIG) incubation programme emerged as winners at the HSBC Swing for the Game Changers 2021 competition.
Magorium and Crunch Cutlery impressed judges with their sustainable solutions to reduce plastic waste in Singapore. They were recognised as the nation’s very own game changers, inspiring others to be forward-looking and ambitious in creating a better and more sustainable future for all.
Both startups will receive support from HSBC to attain their sustainable development goals and contribute to the global green movement.
The competition was organised along the key themes of Sustainability, Grassroots, and Sports. The participating teams were assessed by a panel of esteemed judges on idea originality, sustainability spirit, community benefit, ambition and promise of future growth. Open to tertiary students, it was held in conjunction with the HSBC Women’s World Championship, which concluded on 2 May at the Sentosa Golf Club in Singapore.
Combating the plastic waste problem with edible cutlery
Co-founded by SMU alumna Anna Lam, Crunch Cutlery began as a home-based business last August to produce edible cutlery. It progressed to becoming the first startup in Southeast Asia to address the plastic waste problem and inadequate nutrition among urban dwellers with a single product.
Every year, Singaporeans throw away 500 million utensils of disposable cutlery items. Each Crunch Cutlery used would result in one less plastic cutlery disposed, thereby helping to reduce plastic pollution. In addition, the 100% edible cutleries are packed with flaxseed, chia seeds and whole wheat, giving a boost of Omega 3, Vitamin B3, lignans and fibre with every bite. The edible spoons come in flavours of Pink Strawberry, Green Tea and Beetroot Whole Wheat.
Crunch Cutlery has since grown into a five-person startup and has achieved impressive growth. Its products are available in selected restaurants.
“For our next phase, we look forward to experimenting with different flavours to surprise and delight our fellow Singaporeans,” expressed Anna. For the short term, the startup will focus on partnering with central kitchens and baking facilities to scale production from the current 500 units per month to over 2,000. Looking ahead, it plans to develop an innovative tech solution to automate the mixing, mounding and baking process. With automated manufacturing, it will be able to concentrate on food innovation to develop unique shapes, tastes and formulations to diversify its product range. The goal is to expand Crunch Cutlery in the Asia-Oceania region over the next three years.
The startup is currently incubated under BIG at the Institute of Innovation and Entrepreneurship (IIE), benefiting through mentorship and workshops geared towards brand building.
Reducing & recycling plastic waste with a single technology
According to the National Environment Agency, Singapore generated 868,000 tons of plastic waste in 2020, of which only 4% was recycled. Globally, plastic waste is a growing problem, and there’s a dearth of plastic recycling solutions.
Founded in August 2019 by Oh Chu Xian, a final-year student at the Lee Kong Chian School of Business, and Adriel Ng, a graduate of the School of Accountancy, Magorium aims to tackle the issue with an impactful strategy. The duo conceived a “One-Solution to Two Problems” proprietary technology to recycle plastic waste. This allowed them to produce a new green construction material for building road infrastructure.
The new material seeks to substitute a portion of traditional crude derived bitumen for road construction. By doing so, the technology not only recycles plastic waste, but also reduces the consumption of finite resources and limits carbon emission from the production of traditional bitumen.
The solution is effective in recycling even contaminated and mixed plastic waste, the most problematic streams which few technologies can handle. This makes their technology both more impactful as a recycling solution and commercially viable. Additionally, once plastic waste is converted into the new material, it exists as the only cost-effective bitumen substitute for road construction to date.
Magorium's technologies and building products are the first in Singapore and within the Asia Pacific. The product has already been used to lay roads on a factory site in Tuas and a condominium in Marymount.
The start-up has garnered a number of accolades since its founding, including winning the Startup X: Waste 20/20 Competition, the Best Sustainable Solutions Category of Technode Innovations Award 2020, and a regional finalist of Extreme Tech Challenge (XTC) 2021 organised by SGInnovate.
“Being supported by HSBC’s Game Changers campaign reflects both the organisation’s and general public’s increasing concerns with the plastic waste issue, as well as the indiscriminate consumption of finite resources for infrastructure construction,” Chu Xian shared.
Magorium is working towards commercialising the technology in Singapore and building an infrastructure to successfully recycle plastic waste into a green material. This green material will then support a more sustainable construction scene in Singapore.
Moving forward, it is looking to scale internationally, especially in the Southeast Asian countries plastic waste pollution is rampant. Magorium hopes that its technology can provide these countries with a commercially viable solution to their plastic waste problem, while concurrently building greener roads with the new waste-converted material.
The startup has completed IIE’s incubator programme, which played a vital role in providing the team with a network of mentors throughout the entrepreneurship journey, taking the startup through the business of sustainability.