Südzucker Group wins EIT Food Corporate Startup Collaboration Award
First ever EIT Food Corporate Startup Collaboration Award recognises successful collaboration between corporates and startups
EIT Food has awarded its first ever Corporate Startup Collaboration Award, created to recognise best practices for corporates working in collaboration with agrifood sector startups.
Announced at the 2022 EIT Food Venture Summit in Lisbon, the award was presented to Südzucker Group, chosen for its innovative mindset and open innovation culture.
EIT Food’s vast European-wide network of startups was asked to rate the corporate startup collaborations they have been involved in, giving their feedback on criteria including the corporate partner’s mission alignment, speed of decision-making, entrepreneurial spirit and understanding of the startups’ ways of working.
Supporting the startup ecosystem
“We are delighted to receive this award,” said Florian Weber, Head of New Business Development, Südzucker Group. “Collaborating with startups has been a priority of the Südzucker Group for some time now and we strongly believe in the joint impact and the benefits of trustful partnerships. Receiving this award has been a great confirmation that we are on the right track.”
Benoit Buntinx, Director of Business Creation at EIT Food, added: “At EIT Food, we have an unrivalled network of agrifood startups and corporates in Europe and we have always focused on creating matches between the two.
“We wanted to hear what startups have to say and the Corporate Startup Collaboration Award is the ideal way of showcasing outstanding partnering activities. We believe the award will create a healthy competition and feedback for the corporates to improve how they work with startups. We need good corporate startup collaborations to work, if we are to tackle the big food system challenges together.”
The Corporate Startup Collaboration Award is one of several awards being presented at the Venture Summit, which brought together 300+ investors, corporates, experts and startups from across the European agrifood sector.
