“This fat helps our Future Meat taste juicer,” says Chao Ai-Ching (趙愛卿), chief advisor to Louisa Coffee’s CEO. Many vegetarian meat substitutes can taste dry, but Huang Jen-Yu’s (黃仁佑) company Lypid has created an alternative fat that gives them more meat-like juiciness.

Generally, the vegetable oils used in vegetarian food melt at lower points than the fats found in meat; as soon as you heat them, the oils leaks out from the food matrics. Lypid’s technology raises the melting point of vegetable oils, allowing plant-based meats to have the same juicy texture as real meat.

For those looking for great-tasting vegetarian and vegan foods, this new product is a dream come true. “Fat is flavor,” says Liu Chien-Jui (劉千瑞), owner of Taipei’s famous vegetarian restaurant, Little Tree Food (小小樹食) and one of Lypid’s customers. Liu and Lypid are currently working together to create plant-based shengjian buns, which will have the same juicy taste as the traditional pork-stuffed snack.

“This is a huge commercial opportunity,” says Liu, as the current popularity of sustainable lifestyles means the number of people choosing a vegan or vegetarian diet will only continue to increase.

In the past, most people who followed a vegetarian diet did so for religious reasons. Nowadays, many young people keen to reduce their carbon footprint choose a ‘flexitarian’ diet. (Source: Chien-Ying Chiu)

At first glance, Huang Jen-Yu’s white t-shirt and lean physique give him the appearance of a college student who’s just come off the sports field. But a short conversation reveals a calm and steady temperament beyond his years. Huang, who is just 29, is a self-proclaimed straight-talker; his success in starting a business in America can be attributed to three words: “don’t talk rubbish.”

Leaving Taiwan to establish a start-up is challenging, especially for entrepreneurs like Huang, who lack the advantages of being American-born, or having business-owner parents. How did he do it?

Like many Taiwanese students, Huang chose his major through a process of elimination, finally selecting the least disagreeable option: chemical engineering. After graduating from National Taiwan University’s Department of Chemical Engineering, it took Huang only four years to complete both his Master’s and Ph.D.

During his final year as an undergraduate at National Taiwan University, Huang decided to enter the Young Entrepreneurs of the Future scheme (YEF), run by the Epoch Foundation. His first venture with YEF was to sell mystery bags containing a selection of books from independent bookstores, with the aim of introducing customers to the independent bookstores located around National Taiwan University. Within a month, all 100 mystery bags (priced at NT$500, or around US$16) had sold out.

This experience led Huang to the realization that his innermost desire was to start his own business.

Huang’s next business venture was a project management system, but after time spent in Silicon Valley, he soon realized it would be challenging for the company to find success in the global market, as his team lacked project management experience, and major global companies were already developing similar systems.

After returning to Taiwan, Huang dissolved the company and enrolled in a doctoral program in the U.S.. His goal was clear: to strengthen his academic foundation in chemical engineering, and to one day start a business in the U.S.

According to Michelle Lee (李博婷), his cohort at Cornell and current business partner, Huang is a highly motivated and clear-thinking strategist. At Cornell, Lee remembers, they used to play board games such as Catan and Avalon - Huang never lost a single game. “He is very logical, and knows exactly what he wants,” says Lee.

The word ‘steady’ comes up in almost every conversation about Huang Jen-Yu. Chen Jen-Bin, founder of INSTO and a long-term supporter of Taiwanese entrepreneurs, observed that during his time in the U.S., Huang remained focused on his work and studies. (Source: Chien-Ying Chiu)

At Cornell, Huang joined the lab of a professor specializing in sustainable technology, working on carbon capture technology. As a Ph.D. student, Huang needed to get his thesis accepted by a journal, but he faced many rejections: “It makes you feel like no one is acknowledging you, that the work you’ve spent years on is not considered worthy of publication.” While Huang is generally an optimist, that period of time left him feeling utterly discouraged. However, he summoned the courage to continue his research.

When faced with rejection, Huang emphasizes the importance of understanding that rejection is not targeted at one’s self. Rather, he encourages stepping back from the situation in order to better understand how to align with the requirements of the other party.

After finally succeeding in getting his work published, Huang applied for a grant program under the NSF, "national science foundation.". Graduate students selected for the scheme are expected to interview 100 companies and venture capitalists relevant to a research topic to ensure academic research is closely aligned with the real needs of industry. Every year, there are only 20 places available on the program, and Huang was selected.

Foodland Venture’s co-founder, Agnes Wang （王心怡）, describes Huang as "the Orient Express", saying that his companies always progress faster than investors expect. (Source: Chien-Ying Chiu)

The program’s first challenge for Huang was finding 100 business owners who would be willing to participate in a 30-minute interview. 

Huang’s method was crude but straightforward: message potential interviewees on LinkedIn.

“You reach out to 100 people, and most of them probably won’t get back to you. But even if only five reply, that’s enough!” says Huang, crediting this process with helping him become more thick-skinned.

During the four-month program, Huang traveled all over the U.S., often driving for hours to interview businesses and visit factories. This experience provided a strong foundation for Huang’s entrepreneurial methodology: Through his discussions, Huang developed a clear understanding of industry needs, as well as the conditions necessary to get industry to cooperate on new ventures.

“The focus is on people,” explains Huang. For business owners, the most important thing is whether a new start-up has a team with sufficient technical skill and whether the technology is applicable in the industry. Research funding, on the other hand, is considered an issue that can be solved.

Huang also discovered that although his lab at Cornell was one of the best in the world, it would still take at least 10 years for the carbon-capture technology they were developing to have a real impact on the global environment. However, he realized that reforming the food industry could make an immediate difference to the environment.

Huang took action. He partnered with Michelle Lee (李博婷), who had also studied at National Taiwan University, and was a Ph.D. student working on food science at Cornell. Together, the two began to investigate. They discovered that most of the research into plant-based food had been focused on alternative proteins, but alternative fats and oils had rarely been studied, despite being a pain point for the plant-based meat industry. As Lee’s Ph.D. research was focused on alternative fats, the two decided that’s where they would start.

Lypid's technology increases the melting point of vegetable oils, giving plant-based alternatives the juicy taste of real meat. (Source: Chien-Ying Chiu)

How did Huang raise capital for their start-up in just two days?

Back when he’d been interviewing businesses and venture capital funds, Huang had visited the SOSV IndieBio accelerator, the most important venture capital firm in the food technology industry. Thanks to this visit, he had a clear understanding of SOSV’s preferred model for new ventures. As such, Huang was able to quickly write up a proposal in line with SOSV’s requirements.

Sure enough, two days later Lypid was able to secure US$250,000 in funding from SOSV. The venture capital firm only selects 12 teams each year, out of hundreds of global applicants.

With the start-up fund secured, Huang and Lee immediately began to experiment. After six months, they had successfully developed Phytofat™, a new oil that uses microcapsule technology to raise the melting point of vegetable oils, and thus recreate the taste of meat fats. The breakthrough led to investments totaling US$4 million in Lypid’s first round of seed funding.

“Investors know that this is important, so they will approach you themselves,” says Huang, adding that many investors contact him directly through LinkedIn, just as he had previously used the platform to find people to interview.

“Jen-Yu understands the trends,” says Agnes Wang (王心怡), co-founder of Foodland Ventures, a venture-capital accelerator that specializes in food technology. The development of plant-based meats can be divided into three stages: looking like meat, tasting like meat, and having the same nutritional content as meat. Lypid’s technology is a step toward the second stage: allowing plant-based meats to have the same mouth-feel and texture as real meat. “No other innovation has reached this stage yet,” says Wang, explaining why Lypid is so attractive to investors.

Through Japanese trading company Mitsui and Co., Huang contacted Huang Ming-Hsien (黃銘賢), Chairman of Louisa Coffee, a coffeehouse chain that has long supported vegetarian diets. After a few test sales and positive consumer feedback, ‘Future meat’ hit the shelves of over 500 Louisa Coffee branches across Taiwan.

According to Huang Jen-Yu, half of young people in the United States have adopted a flexitarian diet, and are choosing to eat less meat. Currently, plant-based meat only accounts for 2% of the market but is expected to reach 10%, offering Lypid a significant opportunity. (Source: Chien-Yin Chiu)

From applying to a Ph.D. program at Cornell and gathering industry contacts, to raising millions of dollars in start-up capital and seeing Lypid successfully enter the mainstream market, Huang has undoubtedly accomplished all of his original goals, just perhaps earlier than he expected. “His progress has been extraordinarily fast, just like the Orient Express,” remarks Agnes Wang. 

With his strong strategic sense, and ability to take action, at the age of only 29, Huang Jen-Yu is moving towards the center of the world stage.

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Translated by Elizabeth Frost
Uploaded by Ian Huang