Bellyfood Startup Wins "Culinary Action! On the Road" in Copenhagen
Bellyfood (Denmark), the foodtech startup offering organic meals in tubes, made with natural ingredients and providing real food options for people with feeding tubes, has been named the winner of the first stop of Culinary Action! On the Road held in Copenhagen. This international entrepreneurship program is aimed at foodtech startups and partnered with local organizations Food & Bio Cluster Denmark, Danish Startup Group, and TechBBQ.
Jens Erik Nissen, a member of the Food & Bio Cluster Denmark board, and Ander López, head of entrepreneurship at the Basque Culinary Center, inaugurated the event. It took place during TechBBQ, a major startup event held on September 11–12 in Copenhagen.
The event brought together various industry profiles, from entrepreneurs and investors to agritech experts. Ander López shared insights about the new strategic project GOe–Gastronomy Open Ecosystem, which connects science and gastronomy under the theme "GOe: connecting the dots."
The participating startups—Connecting Grounds, Bellyfood, NordInvent, and Nocla—presented their projects before a jury of experts that included Ander López, head of entrepreneurship at the Basque Culinary Center; Henrik Boelsmand, CTO at Ejendom; Marc Hansen, CEO of Økoskabet (a finalist in the 3rd edition of On the Road); Louise Heiberg, managing director at Nordic Foodtech VC; Claus Mortensen, head of business growth at Food & Bio Cluster Denmark; and Mette Johnsen, CEO at Spora CPH.
The upcoming competitions will take place on October 24 in Rotterdam, November 6 in Tokyo, November 19 in Bahrain, February 2025 in London, and late March 2025 in Boston. The winning startups at each local event will have the opportunity to develop research and innovation projects over 20 hours at BCC Innovation, the technology center in gastronomy at the Basque Culinary Center. Additionally, the startups will gain access to the network of experts and mentors from both the Basque Culinary Center and GOe, and receive support in areas such as access to the investor network, networking, or landing in the local ecosystem.
Finally, the six local finalist startups will compete in a grand final in April 2025 in San Sebastián, where the winners from each country will compete for the top prize in the fourth edition of On the Road. The winning startup will be awarded six months of residency in the startup incubator and an additional 25-hour voucher for research and innovation projects at the gastronomy technology center.