Entrepreneurship

Overview

ReLEAF is an optogenetic bioreactor system that enables on-demand protection against combined biotic and abiotic crop stresses through cell-free delivery of protective proteins. Our mission is to strengthen agricultural resilience by reducing crop losses while decreasing dependence on chemical interventions.

Mission statement: ReLEAF strengthens agricultural resilience by enabling on-demand protection against combined biotic and abiotic stresses through an optogenetic bioreactor, shifting from reactive chemical management to proactive, precision crop defense while reducing environmental contamination.

Vision: Every farmer is a biomanufacturer.

Our vision is to empower every farmer to have their small bacteria factory for producing biostimulants that help plants withstand environmental stresses. Through our bioreactor system, we wish to reduce long bioprocessing times and challenges, so that farmers can benefit from science at a faster rate than the present.

Product description

Product usage and function

Our field-deployable bioreactor is a sealed system containing engineered Bacillus subtilis that uses a hollow-fiber membrane filtration system to deliver protectant molecules directly on the vegetable crops. By restricting all living bacteria inside the device while allowing only the secreted protectants to exit, it automates crop defense without the need for manual spraying or application. The device functions with minimal farmer intervention, requiring only occasional maintenance checks or a cartridge replacement when the protectant runs low. It is fully automated by an Arduino-based control unit, a circulation pump, a temperature sensor, a salinity and a green and red LED optogenetic control system. This integrated tech stack continuously monitors environmental conditions and automatically activates specific stress-response modules the moment predefined thresholds are breached.

The leaf humidity sensor sits on the leaves of crops and tells us the humidity of the leaf surface, with one type of crop using one sensor. The sensor then sends its readings to our AIoT system, which uses the readings to forecast when the crop is going to need protectant. By using the sensor data, the AIoT system also predicts upcoming weather conditions, while the sensor tells the user how the crop is doing. If the leaves show signs of stress before the forecast predicted, the AIoT system can bring production forward accordingly. The AIoT translates this multi-source data into a guidance for farmers without technical background understanding of the bioreactor. Together, the sensor and AIoT link conditions in the field directly to production in the bioreactor, ensuring protectant is available exactly when the crop needs it.

The bacterial culture replenishment system supplies a sealed Bacillus subtilis inoculum in a cartridge that fits the bioreactor’s filter and cartridge design. The cartridge drops into the reservoir port from above and opens automatically once it is seated, so the culture goes straight into the reservoir. There is no need to handle an open culture, and the bioreactor stays closed throughout. Each package includes two culture cartridges together with the main unit. Thus, a replacement is on hand from the first season. Since the culture arrives ready to use, specialized workers do not need a lab, special equipment, or any microbiology skills to prepare fresh culture themselves.

The app pairs up with the bioreactor and consolidates operational information into five modules: Overview, Field Setup, AI Forecast, Log, and Settings. The Overview page shows a prioritized list of required actions, a summary of the current AI forecast, real-time field and reactor measurements, a schematic of the red/green light-control system, and the status of consumables (medium and culture). The Field Setup module records the inputs from farmers regarding the farm location, the crops grown and the area allocated to each, and the numbers of soil sensors and bioreactors already installed. From this data, the system estimates the recommended equipment and its total cost. The AI Forecast module reports a stress risk level for each crop, the estimated time until stress onset based on the farmer’s location, the target quantity of protectant, and the quantity produced to date. Orders are collected in a cart accessible from the header. In the present version, all sensor readings are simulated for demonstration purposes.

Usage method

The steps to using ReLEAF’s product:

1. Ask our team to survey your farm. We check how many soil types you have and whether conditions change from one area to another.
2. Determine how many bioreactors and sensors will be needed to be able to be effective on all of the intended area.
3. Obtain the bioreactor(s), set them up in the soil, and connect it to a pre-existing distribution system or a new one if necessary.
4. Insert the B. subtilis cartridge (replacements can be bought from a distributor)
5. Turn on the device and use the AIoT screen, which will help with setup and data collection.
6. Done!

Ps. If you add our LINE channel, you will be able to send messages/requests/and other questions to us. Account Name: 農友助手

Financial analysis

Overview

Our cost and price depend on the scenario: the farm size, the crop types and the plant density all change how many bioreactors, sensors and cartridges a farm needs. Modelling every combination would give a large grid of results that is hard to read and plan around. To simplify, we calculate everything per hectare, because dose, hardware and cartridges all grow with the area planted.

Farms in Taiwan differ a lot in size, and a model built on farms would need a separate scenario for every size. When we tested sizes from 0.5 to 20 ha, profit per hectare stayed close to US$2,000 to 2,500. Counting hectares therefore gives one break-even target (about 230 ha), however many farms they come from, and it matches how we would sell: by area covered, including through cooperatives. Farm size still matters for how many customers we must win, and the sections below show that effect.

We cost one reference farm: 1 ha, the average Taiwanese farm (Liu, 2018), planted with 3 crop types at 22,000 plants per ha. Everything is calculated per hectare, so one break-even target covers any mix of farm sizes. Year 0 is a build year with fixed cost and no sales; Years 1 to 5 are selling years.

Assumptions

The model uses one reference farm and the settings below.

Fixed cost

Fixed cost is about US$627,000 across Years 0 to 4. Year 0 carries the one-off machines and R&D (about US$53,000). It falls to US$94,000 in Year 1, then rises as the team grows from 3 to 5 people.

Variable cost and price per hectare

A 1 ha farm pays about US$5,500 in Year 1 for a package that costs us about US$2,800, which leaves about US$2,800 of profit. In later years it pays about US$90 for a refill cartridge, which leaves about US$45.

Break-even analysis

We need to sell about 230 ha of paying farms in Years 0 to 4 to cover US$627,000 of fixed costs. At 1 ha per farm that is about 230 farms, or about 57 a year over Years 1 to 4. The figure is cautious: it ignores renewal profit and the cost of the free pilot.

Investors or farmers can use the business model calculator to determine initial costs of our product for their own scale of farm and scenario.

Growth plan

Under the growth plan, cumulative cash bottoms out at -US$196,000 in Year 1 and turns positive in Year 4. The plan sells 20 paying hectares in Year 1, before field results exist.

Return for investors

If we hit the growth plan, investors who fund the US$196,000 low point get 2.3 times their money back by Year 5, an IRR of 24%.

The IRR includes the Year 0 build-year cost. Money back = (funding + cumulative cash in Year 5) ÷ funding. The 20% tax rate and loss carry-forward are unconfirmed.

Summary

To cover Years 0 to 4 fixed cost of about US$627,000 we must sell about 230 ha to paying farms, at roughly US$2,800 profit per hectare.

• Package: about US$5,500 in Year 1 (2 times our cost) and US$90 a year for refills.
• Growth plan: break-even in Year 4, peak funding about US$196,000, IRR 24% before tax (21% after a 20% tax estimate), 2.3 times money back by Year 5.
• Conservative case (70% of planned hectares): break-even in Year 6, funding about US$236,000, IRR about -7%.
• Main risks: the product is not yet tested on any crop, and the farmer must save about US$1,900 a year to pay back in 3 years.

Business model

What is a social enterprise business model?

A social enterprise, at its core, is a business model that aims to use commercial revenue to sustain its operations and advance a social mission, which makes it distinct from an non-governmental organization (NGO). A good example of this is USE-GH, or Ubuntu Social Enterprise-Ghana, which is actually one of the organizations that inspired the very first project pitch for this. USE-GH buys crops from farmers directly, at a much lower fee than middlemen charge. It also teaches farmers to process their raw materials into finished products, so they earn more from the same harvest. As can be seen, the aim is to be able to generate enough profit to continue running all while helping the community the social enterprise wants to support, which in our case is small farmers all over the world.

Why a social enterprise?

Our vision is to have a social impact to empower farmers, which is why we chose this business model instead of a traditional one. We want to be able to preserve our vision in the best way possible while not becoming an NGO, as then operations would be difficult due to high costs.

SWOT analysis PESTEL analysis Social business model canvas Value proposition

SWOT analysis

In order to better understand where our advantages and weaknesses lie, we did a SWOT analysis, carefully considering our strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.

Strengths

Our SWOT analysis highlights the strong potential of our project while weighing key challenges that must be addressed for successful implementation. The system’s primary strengths lie in its modular multi-chamber design, which allows for the targeted, light-triggered production of three specific protective proteins (LEA, ACCD, and BoPEP4). Additionally, its cell-free delivery approach reduces biosafety and regulatory concerns, while its integration of electronic sensors and AI forecasting allows it to deliver precise protectant doses to both soil-based and hydroponic systems. These features provide a sustainable alternative to conventional chemical pesticides or outdated methods while minimizing environmental contamination.

Opportunities

Externally, the project is in a beneficial position due to the rapidly growing biocontrol market, increasing climate-related crop stress, and global support for sustainable agriculture. Additionally, many countries strictly regulate or are in the process of phasing out toxic chemical pesticides, which creates a strong push toward biological alternatives. This widens our market opportunity across both traditional field agriculture and high-tech hydroponic systems, increasing adoption potential amongst growers seeking sustainable solutions. Many companies around the world charge the same amount for microbe fermentation and sensing separately while our product is a two in one for the same price. Furthermore, since the Taiwan government is willing to give subsidies to local farmers, it makes our product more accessible to our stakeholders. Also, our product can be tailor made for different farmers from different backgrounds, which expands our market.

Weaknesses

However, the project also has several weaknesses. There could be potential protectant loss from being washed away by water. Additionally, the bioreactor might not work fast enough when met with a sudden mass onslaught of stress. Imperfections in the bioreactor could lead to dilution of the protectants, while biofouling inside the chambers may reduce protein yield and shorten the system's lifespan. The product may also face limitations in countries with strict organic certification requirements because organic certification standards exclude engineered inputs, so we do not target organic farms. Furthermore, farmers would need to learn how to replace cartridges, which could increase long-term maintenance costs and create an additional barrier to adoption. With the bioreactor, the hollow fibre membrane might get blocked, which can slow down or potentially prevent excretion.

Threats

Finally, several external threats could affect the success of the product. Unclear regulations surrounding cell-free agricultural biologics may delay approval, especially if the product falls between the classifications of a biological pesticide and a synthetic biology-derived compound. Farmer adoption may also be limited by unfamiliarity with the technology, concerns about cost-effectiveness, and reliance on traditional chemical pesticides. In addition, some farmers may view synthetic biology as too risky, while restrictions on organic certification could limit access to high-value organic farming markets. Lastly, the bioreactor may get destroyed by natural disasters such as the frequent earthquakes or typhoons in Taiwan.

PESTEL analysis

Political factors create both challenges as well as opportunities. Government regulations on GMO crops represent a significant barrier to market entry in regions with strict policies. However, this also presents us with potential pathways for government support through green-tech initiatives and agricultural subsidies, which could accelerate adoption rates while reducing development costs.

Economic considerations directly influence the market viability of our product. High fertilizer and pesticide prices drive demand for sustainable alternatives, which creates favorable market conditions for our bioreactor. Furthermore, global supply chain disruptions affecting chemical fertilizer delivery could actually strengthen demand for locally produced alternatives like our bioreactor, since farmers would face shortages and price spikes. At the same time, shifts in agricultural spending patterns may affect customers’ purchasing power.

Social factors are critical to the success of our product. Public perception and acceptance of GMOs are relatively mixed, which requires strong communication strategies and transparency about the safety and benefits of our product. The growing consumer demand for eco-friendly farming practices aligns well with our value proposition, although we must navigate cultural attitudes toward agricultural innovation in different markets.

Technological advancement is also a key component. Rapid developments in AI and forecasting tools allow us to create competitive advantages through better performance as well as monitoring fields in real-time. Standardized manufacturing processes for hardware and sensors are able to reduce scaling barriers.

Environmental pressures also pose benefits and risks. Severe climate threats including droughts, heat waves, and fungal disease create an immediate demand for crop resilience solutions. The global push to meet UN Sustainable Development Goals (particularly SDGs 2, 4, 10, 12, 15) reinforces the market need for our environmental solution while opening doors to funding focused on sustainability.

Legal and regulatory frameworks also require a lot of careful navigation. Environmental release and biosafety laws determine how our bioreactor can be deployed in the market, while regulatory limitations for engineered biological products in food are very complex across different institutions. However, at the same time, clear regulatory pathways could potentially accelerate approval timelines.

Social business model canvas

Key partners

Our operations rely on collaboration with agricultural distributors, farms, and contract manufacturing organizations to bring our solutions to market. We collaborate with professors and university experts for technical guidance, alongside government organizations and extensions to ensure aligned regulatory support and community reach.

Key activities

Core operations focus on extensive lab and field testing, fermentation, quality control (QC), and verifying Freedom to Operate (FTO) alongside existing patents. Additionally, we actively invest in education, promotional outreach, and intellectual property (IP) protection to safeguard and drive our technology forward.

Beneficiary segments

The primary beneficiaries targeted by our initiative include both large-scale and small-scale farmers who directly utilize the crop protection solution, as well as agricultural distributors managing local supply networks.

Key resources

Our critical assets comprise essential lab and field trial data, customer/partner feedback, planned patent applications, quality raw materials, and specialized technical expertise. Funding and support are further grounded through partnerships with NGOs, government organizations, and larger farms equipped with appropriate resources.

Beneficiary relationships

We build trust with beneficiaries by offering a free trial period to establish our reputation and demonstrate value. Operating under a social enterprise model, we maintain an accessible, small basic fee structure to keep the solution affordable for underserved growers.

Channels

We reach our audiences through active social media engagement, direct distributor networks, our official website, and targeted print media such as posters in regional agricultural hubs.

Payer segments

Financial sustainability is maintained by securing revenue and funding from agricultural distributors, NGOs, government organizations, and well-funded industrial farms.

Cost structure

Our cost drivers include fixed R&D/production, marketing/branding, delivery logistics, and official certification expenses. Notably, the unit manufacturing cost remains uniform whether produced for small-scale or large-scale farming applications.

Revenue value

Financial viability relies on tiered pricing models, cross-subsidies, and direct grant/funding support from NGOs and government bodies to sustain our social enterprise model. Success is measured beyond monetary terms through yield saved, chemical usage avoided, and overall social and environmental returns.

Long-term mission and agricultural impact

Ultimately, our mission extends to supporting long-term agricultural resilience and vision goals. By collaborating with local agricultural extension stations, research institutes, and cooperatives, we aim to stabilize seasonal farm incomes, prevent climate-driven debt cycles, preserve ancestral land assets, and make sustainable farming viable for future generations. Overall, our system gives farmers an automatic, customizable, more effective, and sustainable way to reduce crop losses from environmental and disease stress while lowering chemical use and improving yield reliability.

Value proposition

Our unique value proposition highlights the advantages of our bioreactor system containing engineered Bacillus subtilis that continuously monitors the conditions of plants and releases protectants when predetermined thresholds are reached. Our system offers farmers an automatic, customizable, more effective, and sustainable way to reduce crop losses from both environmental and disease stress while lowering chemical use and improving yield reliability.

Current challenges and solutions

Current management methods often depend on repeated chemical spraying, manual monitoring, and frequent maintenance, leading to higher labor costs, chemical waste, environmental pollution, and inefficient use of resources. In addition, these traditional solutions are rarely tailored to the specific conditions of individual farms, making it difficult for farmers to identify the right time to intervene. By combining stress detection and treatment in a single platform, our technology reduces unnecessary chemical inputs, minimizes waste and runoff, lowers daily labor requirements, promotes faster plant recovery, and helps maintain more stable crop yields during challenging growing seasons.

Our solution

Unlike traditional agricultural inputs that rely on centralized chemical manufacturing and reactive spraying, our system introduces novel solutions. Instead of shipping chemical bottles to the field, we deploy an on-site, on-demand field factory directly to the farm. This bridges the gap left by standard solutions, which either rely on chemical inputs that cause runoff, basic biostimulants that lack automatic delivery, or passive alert sensors that identify stress but rely on farmers to dilute and mix protectants on their own. Our bioreactor uses engineered Bacillus subtilis to continuously evaluate crop conditions by pairing real-time field sensors with predictive stress forecasting. When environmental or biological threats pass a safety threshold, the device automatically synthesizes targeted protectants to address climate stress and plant disease precisely when and where intervention is required. Built with a flexible, modular design, the system can be adapted across different crop types and growing setups. It also takes into great consideration of biosafety, ensuring engineered bacteria remain safely contained inside the hardware to allow only active protectants to reach the crops. From our lab testing, by using our ACCD aftertreatment, the fresh weight of Arabidopsis has doubled in comparison with control treatment testing with TB. We predict that could be cross-applied to other crop types in the future with further testing. Furthermore, our solutions offer a cheaper solution and more competitive price when compared with other companies that offer similar options.

Alignment with United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

Furthermore, this approach directly aligns with several key United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs):

• SDG 2 (Zero Hunger): Protects crop yields against severe climate events and stabilizes farmer incomes without increasing manual field labor.
• SDG 10 (Reduced Inequality): Through the social enterprise business model, we allow both small and industrial farmers to have equal access to our technology, regardless of their original purchasing ability
• SDG 12 (Responsible Consumption and Production): Minimizes chemical runoff, reduces operational waste, and builds resilient local food production networks.
• SDG 15 (Life on Land): Provides a proactive climate-adaptation tool that protects plant health while preserving natural soil microbiomes and land usability

Market analysis

Stakeholder analysis Key stakeholders Industry analysis Competitor analysis

Stakeholder analysis

A traditional business model canvas focuses on single value exchange, in which the company encompasses the design of value creation, delivery, and revenue generation mechanisms within an organization. However, our social business model canvas is designed for social enterprises that aim to create impact while sustaining financial success. It recognizes that the paying customers and beneficiaries may overlap, while subsidies allow us to reach farmers who cannot pay full price.

Manage most thoroughlyKeep completely informedAnticipate and meet needsRegular minimal contact

Manage most thoroughly

Small Scale Farmers

Our product plans to directly impact their livelihood by reducing their crop loss and potential health risks associated with exposure to chemical protectants. Since our business plan aims to support and subsidise their purchases, we should keep them directly involved and informed throughout the process.

Conventional farming farmers

Farmers who rely primarily on chemical fertilizer and pesticides often prioritise yield and cost. This group represents part of the smallholder farmers we are targeting. According to the Agriculture and Food Agency, Ministry of Agriculture, only 3.47% of Taiwan’s total farmland is organic and eco-friendly by 2024. Globally, 2.1% of agricultural land was managed organically in 2023, which in other words, over 97% of farmers worldwide are conventional, so if ReLEAF can’t earn the conventional farmer’s trust, the addressable market will shrink.

Sustainable farming farmers

Sustainable farming farmers are the ones who prioritize reduced chemical input and soil health. Convincing this segment can prove that our engineered Bacillus subtilis will not cause pollution while being sustainable, which earning their adoption would serve as an additional point of validation and credibility for our project.

Industrial Farm

Large-scale commercial operations that represent massive market validation and revenue potential. By collaborating with them, we tailored enterprise solutions and collected data on crop growth from them using our product in order to prove yield consistency.

Yes Health iFarm

Yes Health iFarm is a Taiwan commercial indoor vertical farm. They are a valuable stakeholder to us since they do precision farming to collect data and increase crop yields, with LED lighting, and pesticide-free growing methods, which is similar to our main goal. Therefore, we can also learn from their ideas without copying them.

Professors / Experts / Researchers

The experts can provide us feedback about the design through technical consultation and can shape our project direction and experimental design. In return, we can provide data collected from our sensors for them to further study their expertise.

Keep completely informed

CH Biotech

Taiwan biotech company specializing in plant growth and systemic biostimulants. We can consult with them about our protectant since they are already selling protectants in Taiwan and other countries, so we can learn from how they expand their business and the regulations in not only Taiwan but globally.

Agriculture distributor

Agriculture distributors understand farmers’ demand more since they interact directly with the farmers actively, which they hold practical knowledge of purchasing behavior, price sensitivity, and product concerns that we would otherwise have to gather more slowly. They also have a more complete supply chain, which will allow us to reach the farmers easily.

Anticipate and meet needs

Government (for regulations)

The government cares immensely about environmental safety laws and agricultural standards, a single policy shift can make or break our product compliance. To ensure our product fits the regulations, we should ensure all certifications are up to date and comply with safety and environmental laws.

World Vegetable Center

An international non-profit organization with massive global influence in agricultural development. Our project might just be a small part compared to them, but we should still keep track with them since their support or network could scale our social impact globally.

Government Organization (Agricultural Research and Extension Station, Department of Agricultural Science and Technology, Taiwan Agricultural Research Institute)

Researchers in these departments hold immense scientific credibility. By contacting and keeping track of these departments, they can consult us about real field conditions in Taiwan and how we should design our product to avoid breaking the law and regulations. In return, we can also provide data for them to further study their expertise.

Academia Sinica

As Taiwan’s top academic institution, Academia Sinica leads cutting-edge research across disciplines. Their input enhanced our design in different parts, including the gene circuit, engineered Bacillus subtilis, and hardware. By collaborating with their researchers, we can learn from their research and gain more feedback on the design.

Regular minimal contact

Agritalk

A company that provides farmers with deep-dive analysis on farm production, agricultural policy, new technology, and commodity markets. They are classified as our competitor, but won’t dictate our operational success.

Schools & Students

Our outreach involved hands-on science education with students, introducing synthetic biology and sustainability. Although they won’t affect the development of our product, they still represent our commitment to inclusivity and long-term behavior change through education.

General Public

We monitored public interest through interviews, workshops, and social media. Engaging with the public helped amplify our impact, though they hold limited power over the development.

Key stakeholders

Integrated Human Practices

Ubuntu Social Enterprise GhanaProfessor 陳文亮World Vegetable CentreCH Biotech (正瀚生技)BIO-Asia Taiwan Exhibition VisitMs. Chen, Hui-WenSmart Agriweek TaiwanDirector Wu, Tzu-HsienAgriweatherProf. Chang, Hung-Hao

Ubuntu Social Enterprise Ghana

Contribution to Business Plan. Helped us better understand what it’s like for small farmers who face climate stress, and also greatly inspired our project.

What we changed. Inspired our initial project, including the idea of helping small farmers to combat stress

Professor 陳文亮

Contribution to Business Plan. At our first meeting, he suggested that we should not only focus on the local market, but also expand it globally, as the limited scale of the local market may limit our potential revenue. He highlighted some challenges that we need to address, including farmers’ adoption, competition with chemical fertilizers, limited market, and regulations. Additionally, he suggested that we treat the bioreactor and B. subtilis like a printer and ink, the bioreactor can release the B. subtilis, and the B. subtilis can be replaced like an ink cartridge. During the second meeting, he suggested that we should consider the ReLEAF database as a platform for organizing experimental data and supporting future optimization and agricultural applications.

What we changed. Realized it’s not possible to compete price-wise with chemical fertilizers so we removed that from our business plan, and he gave us the idea of selling our data. After chatting with him, we started looking even deeper into Taiwanese and international regulations for the business plan.

World Vegetable Centre

Contribution to Business Plan. After the meeting, we realized that we needed to demonstrate that our product is environmentally safe, beneficial, and sustainable, as these factors may increase our product’s acceptance among traditional and natural farmers. In addition, we might need to do more regulations research on the usage of GMOs in order to prove it won’t harm the environment or easily escape the containment of our bioreactor.

CH Biotech (正瀚生技)

Contribution to Business Plan. Advised that we research more about regulations in Taiwan and any country we plan to expand to before actually taking action.

BIO-Asia Taiwan Exhibition Visit

Contribution to Business Plan. From a conversation with Bioeconomy Corporation from Malaysia there, they suggested we should further research Southeast Asian countries, as many of them have large agricultural sectors but have looser laws in comparison to countries such as the US or coalitions like the EU.

What we changed. Decided to research regulations in Southeast Asian countries and ended up deciding to expand to the Philippines and Indonesia after Taiwan.

Ms. Chen, Hui-Wen

Contribution to Business Plan. As someone that practices organic and hands-free farming, she stands at the complete opposite of the spectrum in comparison to us, so speaking to her brought many valuable perspectives and new ideas that we previously hadn’t considered. By visiting Ms. Chen’s Happy Farm in Tamsui, we learned about traditional and natural farmers’ perspectives on the application of technology in agriculture, allowing us to gain a better understanding of their needs. Ms. Chen also emphasized the importance of addressing the concern that providing plants with external support may prevent them from adapting to environmental challenges and developing resilience through their own responses.

What we changed. Added some aspects to the weaknesses of our product and was able to better address the aspects of different farmers within the business plan.

Smart Agriweek Taiwan

Contribution to Business Plan. By visiting the Smart Agriweek Exhibition, we learned that the main demographic that will be interested in our product is young farmers, but it also means that we need to find ways to convince older farmers to also adopt our product. Moreover, regulations will definitely be hard for us as a product that uses GMOs. Additionally, we now know that we have a pricing and value advantage, as our product counts as many products in one for a much cheaper price than it would take for a farmer to, for example, buy both BioBar and AgriWeather’s products. Talking with them also allowed us to receive confirmation that government sectors are willing to help and subsidise products that are like ours if necessary.

What we changed. Finalized our own pricing based on the pricing we learned from other companies that are selling products similar to ours such as BioBar and AgriWeather, along with adding a new aspect to the value proposition.

Director Wu, Tzu-Hsien

Contribution to Business Plan. During the meeting with Director Wu, we discussed regulations in Taiwan, target crops, farmers’ adoption likelihood/cost considerations, and our cost calculations. It brought to our attention the fact that we’re still missing factory, labour, bacterial cultivation, and the additional costs of waste management in our calculations. She also encouraged us to identify more commercially valuable crops that are vulnerable to environmental stress as our target crop in the business plan. It emphasized the need to demonstrate the effectiveness of the protectant, ensure biosafety, and treat agricultural waste. Furthermore, it acts as a bridge between us and the farmers to promote our product through its reliability as a government sector.

What we changed. We will be focusing on 1 or 2 very specific crops for our project so that we can have a clearer demographic, and create a better explanation for the value of having a sensor like ours instead of an automated system that sprays cheaper and easier to transport protectants. Additionally, Director Wu can work as a bridge between us and the farmers for future cooperations regarding subsidising, or other farmer support plans.

Agriweather

Contribution to Business Plan. He mentioned that since our bioreactor doesn’t connect to a farm’s irrigation system, it means that farmers have to go there and collect it themselves or use a drone. This means we have to justify the usage of our bioreactor when using a system like theirs that can just control and do everything for them is much more convenient. Mr. Lu also mentioned that we need a more specific staged adoption plan for farmers, along with the fact that products often pass and become popular by word of mouth, both between farmers and from Ag. Research Extension Branches or researchers that farmers trust.

What we changed. expand our product positioning and explain why our product does not come as an easier-to-transport bottle.

Prof. Chang, Hung-Hao

Contribution to Business Plan. Evaluate ReLEAF’s market feasibility and commercialization potential. The email consultation focused on farmer adoption, regulation, biosafety, and economic viability.

What we changed. Do more research on the regulation and narrow the initial application to a specific stress and crop.

Industry analysis

Total addressable market

About 570 million farms worldwide (Ritch and Roser 22), with over 916 million people working on farms and the agricultural sector in 2023 (FAO 25).

Serviceable available market

399 million farms, or 70% of farmers report being affected by climate stress (Bayer, 2023).

Serviceable obtainable market

Hard to quantify because it’s not something that has a clear definition or method of registration, but there are around 4.7 million organic farms worldwide.

Overview of the global protectant industry

The global protectant industry is within the agricultural sector, valued at 77.17 billion USD, as rapid climate changes and a growing population demand for more and better crops, this market is rapidly expanding. The more specific market that we will be in is bioprotectants, or biocontrol agents where biological parts are used to create protectants, instead of the chemicals that usually dominate the market. This market was valued at 9.4B USD in 2024, and is projected to reach 22.8B by 2030, providing strong proof of future growth and hindering market failure. In comparison, the chemical fertilizer/protectant market has already reached 216.52 billion USD in 2025, and is projected to reach 299.69 billion USD by 2030.

Key companies in bio-protectants

Key bioprotectant companies are driving the shift toward more sustainable crop protection by developing biological alternatives to conventional chemical pesticides. Bioprotectant leaders such as Bayer AG, BASF SE, Syngenta AG, and Corteva Agriscience are accelerating innovation in the rapidly growing bioprotectants market through research, strategic partnerships, and expanded commercial production of biological crop protection products. One such example is CH Biotech in Taiwan, which produces biological protectants similar to ours, which can create opportunities for potential collabs.

Market opportunities

As resistance to chemical pesticides continues to increase and global climate movements accelerate the adoption of more sustainable farmer practices, the interest in bioprotectants has also increased. Climate change is making weather patterns increasingly unpredictable, introducing new environmental stresses that traditional farming experience alone can no longer reliably anticipate or manage. This creates a need for intelligent systems that can respond to changing conditions in real time. Our bioreactor addresses this gap by continuously sensing environmental and plant stress signals, producing only the specific bioprotectants necessary. By combining automation, precision, and sustainable bioproduction, our bioreactor represents a new generation of agricultural technology designed to help revitalize farming in an increasingly uncertain climate.

Challenges

Despite all these opportunities, our product will undeniably face several challenges on the market. Our product is unlikely to be more effective than the current best chemical solutions, and because of all the components included within it, is unable to match the price of chemical solutions either without sacrificing revenue entirely. Due to our product including GMOs, it will face legal hurdles such as extensive testing, heavy usage restrictions, and close government surveillance, as GMOs are treated with much caution by several countries and key markets, such as the European Union, Australia, and our home country, Taiwan. This could also restrict how much of our product we can distribute throughout countries and in Taiwan, and make it so that the person buying our product needs a license to use it. Aside from existing legal challenges, there’s also existing stigma regarding synthetic organisms that may push farmers away from purchasing our product, as they fear it could negatively affect the environment or escape the containment of our bioreactor. The B. subtilis itself could also present a challenge in that its survival rate may be too low to truly be sustainable, causing a need for frequent switches and creating a high cost to using our product that will likely alienate our target demographic, who are smaller, sustainable farmers.

Strategic positioning

Our product is the first on the market that is able to respond in real time to the stresses faced by plants, where the protectants are only produced when stress reaches a threshold level and at the exact amount that is suitable for the farm it is used on. Unlike current solutions, which require farmers to determine when, where, and how much protectant to apply, our system automates these decisions. This type of customisability and specificity is unique to our product, and unlike current solutions which require farmers to constantly have to interpret when to use protectants, how much to use, and where to use it, risking overuse or underuse that not only harms plants, but also the environment. Additionally, because our bioreactor has a sensing, response, and production system all in one, our product also has competitive pricing in comparison to other similar products, which can price around 80,000 to 100,000NTD for just sensing or just protectant production. Our bioreactor and B. subtilis is also capable of responding to several specific types of stress, instead of just using one cure-all that could be unsuitable to fully tackle the biological effects of a certain stress type on various crops.

Competitor analysis

Feature	Syngenta	Pinsoa Chemical	CH Biotech 正瀚生技	Advanced Green Biotechnology 聯發生物科技	AgriWeather 阿龜微氣候	ReLEAF
Real-time automated sensing	No	No	No	No	Yes	Yes
Eco-friendly, zero chemical residue	No	No	Yes	Yes	No	Yes
Targeted bioprotection	No	No	Yes	No	No	Yes
On-site, on-demand production	No	No	No	No	Yes	Yes

Summary

Our project stands out from competitors by establishing a decentralized, on-site, and on-demand field-deployed factory. Unlike hardware-only systems like AgriTalk or Smart Control Boxes that provide data or automation without any physical treatment, our system directly addresses current solution gaps by producing and applying targeted treatments right where they are needed. This eliminates the labor-intensive, completely manual spraying required by standard biostimulant and biopesticide platforms like Robigo, APOLO Biotech, BioWorks, or Flourish, minimizing human error and optimizing application timing. This enables high ecological efficiency and precise crop protection with minimal waste, offering immense scalability and operational cost reduction over time.

By generating solutions on-demand right on the farm, our system offers targeted activity, enabling a cleaner, safer, and more autonomous farming process with lower resource inputs and broader crop compatibility.

Marketing strategy

Pricing

Our pricing strategy is designed around seasonal agricultural cash flow. Throughout Taiwan and Southeast Asia, most smallholder farmers earn their income primarily after harvest cycles. To overcome the high upfront cost of hardware, the system is designed as a low-cost reusable base unit paired with replaceable, seasonal peptide cartridges. Target pricing centers around the abiotic stress present during the growing season. Adoption is most likely if one season of the service costs the same as the existing method and if the device reduces repeat spraying labor and crop loss risk. However, farmers now evaluate solutions based on yield stability, affordability, and reduction of financial risk. A solution would be a reusable drive and a replaceable cartridge system that aligns best with farmer spending behavior which would be a low-cost reusable base device and replaceable seasonal peptide cartridges.

Initial sales strategy

Our initial sales strategy focuses on partnering with organizations rather than individual farmers, allowing for faster adoption, larger-scale deployment, and greater credibility. By working with established agricultural networks, we can efficiently introduce our technology to multiple farms while building trust through institutional support.

Distribution

At the beginning of our product launch, our platform is not big enough to successfully perform a sufficient amount of direct sales, so our distribution will primarily be done through partnering with agricultural distributors to sell our product. This way, we can influence the Taiwanese market without having to expend the time and energy to directly make connections just to sell our product.

Our distribution will primarily be done through selling our product to middlemen and selling internationally, as the laws and regulations in Taiwan may make it difficult for our product to be approved and widely distributed here. Therefore, the best option is to first expand to more open international markets such as the United States of America, Philippines, and Thailand. These locations have looser laws on GMOs and AgTech than areas such as Europe or Japan, and are highly affected by increasing climate stress, so these markets have higher demand for our product. Our product will be distributed in a B2B way, indirectly through middlemen that will buy our product and then distribute them afterwards to farmers, as they will have more sway and connections to various types of farmers and areas than us.

Promotion and advertising

Our target market is conventional smallholder farmers, and our entire promotion strategy is built around them. To reach these target farmers where they appear most, we will focus our efforts through local agricultural institutions, extension stations, and cooperatives. To build trust within these farming communities, we use a zero-configuration physical interface designed specifically for them. It eliminates all complex inputs and uses a heavy-duty, single-button system with mechanically keyed cartridges for our target farmers to operate.

To convince these smallholders to try the system and lower their financial risk, we will offer them a free trial period. We will also use a seasonal rental, shared ownership model, or subsidize their purchases either through collaboration with the government or by using our own profits to pay for part of the cost. This keeps the cost equal to or less than what they already spend on chemical fungicides, which lowers the financial barrier for these farmers. One way we can do this is through cooperation with Taiwan Agricultural Research Institute, who can promote our product to various farmer demographics and help subsidise the initial purchase of our bioreactor and first few purchases of the bacteria cartridge. To establish early trust, we introduce the hardware first to show operational reliability before introducing the cartridges. Once our pilot farms reach our target of 10-15% higher yield and 20-30% less spraying, measured against their own previous season, we will launch a referral discount. This rewards our target farmers for recommending the system to others, using their networks to speed up adoption.

Barriers to entry

Marketing timeline

Our sales strategy will launch in 2027, aiming to drive the adoption of our bioreactor system across key agricultural sectors, including local farming cooperatives, general public, and regional extension networks with a strong interest in climate resilience and sustainable crop protection. This strategy is designed to build credibility, trust and expand our market reach while offering financial options that can cover both immediate field deployment for conventional smallholder farmers and long-term stakeholder engagement. By prioritizing early trust with local smallholders, we aim to establish a reliable commercial foundation that can support sustainable community growth over time.

Future plans

Product development plan

The bioreactor is a compact optogenetic bioreactor system using Bacillus subtilis to produce protective compounds (LEA proteins, ACCD, and BoPEP4) for management of different types of crop stress. Light-controlled gene expression regulates compound production in real-time, delivering targeted protection to smallholder farms.

ReLEAF has shown proof of concept in the lab. Our next steps are to make it into a product farmers can use, guided by what experts told us and by the gaps in our own data.

Cartridge design

Following Professor 陳文亮's suggestion, ReLEAF uses a “printer and ink” model. Farmers buy the bioreactor once and replace the B. subtilis culture like an ink cartridge. Our current cartridge is sealed. It drops into the reservoir port and opens once seated, so farmers never handle live culture.

Next, we will redesign the cartridge and bioreactor in two ways:

• Connect to irrigation. Farmer Mr. Lu pointed out that a bioreactor not linked to irrigation leaves the farmer to collect and apply the protectant by hand.
• Keep culture viable for six months. The cartridge must last its full shelf life, which sets how often farmers need refills.

Regulation follow-up

Taiwan’s Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) and the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency (APHIA) restrict field release of genetically modified organisms. However, a system where the engineered bacteria never leave a sealed device can be classed as contained-use equipment. ReLEAF releases only cell-free protectants through a 0.2 µm hollow-fiber membrane, so our next steps are:

• Prove containment. We will run escape-frequency assays and test membrane integrity. We will ask government-recognized units, such as the Taiwan Agricultural Research Institute (TARI) and the Tainan District Agricultural Research and Extension Station, to verify the results.
• Register as a biostimulant. Under Taiwan’s Fertilizer Regulations, registering LEA and ACCD as biostimulants takes about 30 days. Registering as a biopesticide would take 3 to 5 years.

CH Biotech and the World Vegetable Center both advised us to settle the regulations in each market before entering it. Every expansion step below therefore starts with regulatory consultation.

Target crop field testing

iGEM rules limit our plant experiments to Arabidopsis thaliana. In our wet lab, ACCD-treated plants gained 50% more fresh weight than untreated plants. Director Wu Tzu-Hsien stressed that we need to show the same effect on a commercially valuable crop that suffers from environmental stress.

We chose tomato because heat above about 32 °C by day and 20 °C by night reduces its fruit set (Sato et al., 2000). The enzyme dose in our model (203 U per hectare per spray) has not yet been tested on tomato, so field trials are our most important next step. Pilot trials with Taiwanese smallholder farmers are planned for October 2027 to June 2028, using 20 to 50 devices.

Deployment

Taiwan first. We will launch through partnerships with TARI, regional agricultural extension stations, cooperatives and farmers. At Smart Agriweek Taiwan, government representatives told us they are willing to support and subsidize technologies like ReLEAF.

The Philippines next. At the BIO-Asia Taiwan exhibition, Bioeconomy Corporation from Malaysia recommended that we look at Southeast Asia, which has large agricultural sectors and less strict regulations than the US or EU. In 2024, Philippine agriculture, forestry and fishing generated about ₱1.78 trillion in gross value added, while rice (palay) output fell 4.8% from 2023 (Philippine Statistics Authority, 2025). The Fertilizer and Pesticide Authority (FPA) gives us a clear regulator to consult first. Whether we expand will depend on regulatory feedback, field results and farmer demand, not on market size alone.

Financial projection

Every farm is different, so ReLEAF does not have one fixed price. In our interactive model, farmers enter three things:

The densities come from the Tainan District Agricultural Research and Extension Station (2012). From these inputs, the model calculates the number of plants and how much enzyme each spray needs. It then works out the hardware the farm needs:

• Bioreactors: about two per hectare. Each produces a 1 L batch every 16 hours.
• Sensors: one moisture sensor per crop type.
• Cartridges: enough to cover either the protectant the farm uses or the six-month shelf life, whichever runs out first.

Director Wu pointed out costs we had left out: factory, labor, bacterial cultivation and waste management. We added them to the model. Each farmer can then see a Year 1 package price, which includes hardware and cartridges, and a lower yearly cost after that, when they only buy cartridges.

When we tested farm sizes from 0.5 to 20 ha, profit stayed at about US$2,000 to 2,500 per hectare. This gives a single break-even target of about 230 ha, however many farms that area comes from.

Target market

ReLEAF sells farms a kit: bioreactors that grow our protective bacteria, sensors that show when plants are stressed, and cartridges of freeze-dried bacteria that need to be refilled. We grow in phases: first we prove the product and run pilot farms in Taiwan, then we sell in Taiwan, and we repeat the same steps one country at a time (the Philippines, then Thailand, with the US and EU as later options). In Taiwan, the average farm is only about 1 hectare: 0.77 ha by census figures and 1.1 ha in a 2015 report (DGBAS, 2020; FFTC, 2015). We build the kit and the numbers for a farm of this size.

Investments

For our funding, we decided to develop it into three development stages: R&D to iGEM Jamboree, Post-iGEM proof-of-concept validation, and First commercial pilot deployment.

Regulations

Taiwan presents a unique regulatory opportunity forming the foundation of our Phase 2 strategy. Taiwan has stringent restrictions against Living Modified Organisms (LMOs) and GMO field releases under the Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) and Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency (APHIA). However, Taiwan’s regulatory framework contains a critical pathway: “if engineered bacteria never leave the sealed device, the system can be classified as ‘contained-use’ equipment rather than an environmental release of GMOs” (APHIA).

ReLEAF’s system is fundamentally cell-free delivery: non-living metabolic byproducts (protective proteins) are discharged into soil, not viable Bacillus subtilis cells. The engineered bacteria remain physically confined via the hollow-fiber membrane. By legally proving “absolute containment” to APHIA and MOA, we bypass the restrictive environmental-release framework and pursue a streamlined contained-use approval pathway.

Biosafety validation standards

Escape-frequency assays, hollow-fiber membrane integrity testing, physical housing durability testing, and field trial protocols demonstrating no environmental bacterial release during pilot deployment with 20–50 devices are all ways that we can prove the validity of our biosafety. We will partner with government-recognized testing units such as Taiwan Agricultural Research Institute (TARI) and Tainan District Agricultural Research & Extension Station to verify containment and provide the aforementioned regulatory credibility.

Approval timeline

ReLEAF will pursue a phased regulatory strategy, beginning with containment validation and product classification in Taiwan before expanding into the Philippines and other international markets. The market expansion order is as follows: Taiwan → Philippines → Thailand → United States → European Union.

Organic farming and genetically modified organism (GMO) concerns

Organic farming presents another consideration for ReLEAF’s implementation onto the market, because organic certification standards strictly ban GMO usage, which makes farmers hesitant to use our product, even if the protectants produced already exist in plants, as the protectants are produced by a GMO.

We attempt to address GMO concerns through physical containment in our bioreactor, where a hollow-fibre membrane keeps our B. subtilis inside the production compartment and permits only our protectants to pass through. Despite that, we also understand that organic farmers are still unlikely to be our customers.

The distinction is particularly important across ReLEAF’s planned markets. Taiwan’s Organic Agriculture Promotion Act restricts GMOs and their products in organic production. Another example is the fact that the United States Department of Agriculture’s National Organic Program also excludes genetic engineering methods from organic production. In these markets, using a cell-free formulation may not overcome restrictions associated with the engineered production process. In the Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia, and Malaysia, ReLEAF must likewise assess the relevant national organic standards and permitted-input requirements rather than assume that cell-free delivery guarantees eligibility.

For this reason, ReLEAF will initially prioritize sustainable and conventional agricultural markets and not approach organic farmers for regulatory concerns. Where necessary, ReLEAF will seek written determinations or phone competent authorities and organic certification bodies before making claims about suitability for certified organic farms.

Approval phases

Next direction: the Philippines

The Philippines is a promising next market for ReLEAF because of its substantial agricultural sector and the potential value of technologies that help crops withstand abiotic stress. According to the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA), agriculture, forestry, and fishing generated approximately ₱1.78 trillion in gross value added in 2024. The country also produced 19.09 million metric tons of palay (unmilled rice) that year, across 4.65 million hectares of harvested area. However, palay production declined by 4.8% compared with 2023, illustrating the importance of improving agricultural resilience and productivity (Philippine Statistics Authority [PSA], 2025). These figures establish the scale of the agricultural sector, although they do not by themselves prove demand for ReLEAF or establish that abiotic stress caused the decline.

The Philippines is also a practical regional expansion candidate because it has an established regulatory authority for agricultural inputs: the Fertilizer and Pesticide Authority (FPA). This provides a clear institutional starting point for determining how ReLEAF’s cell-free output could be classified, what evidence would be required, and which local partners could support testing and distribution. The Philippines should therefore be evaluated as a potential second market after Taiwan, with expansion contingent on regulatory feedback, field validation, affordability, and farmer demand—not on market size alone.

Philippine regulatory clearance

ReLEAF’s entry into the Philippines would require separate assessments of the bioreactor, engineered production culture, and cell-free agricultural output. These components should not be assumed to share a single approval pathway.

1. Confirm the product classification. ReLEAF should first consult the Philippine Fertilizer and Pesticide Authority (FPA) to determine whether the final cell-free protein/peptide formulation can be registered as a fertilizer or another recognized agricultural input. Our intended positioning is abiotic-stress tolerance rather than pest or pathogen control, but the final classification depends on the product’s composition, intended use, claims, and the FPA’s assessment. The FPA regulates agricultural fertilizers and pesticides and requires applicable product registrations and handler licences before regulated products are marketed.
2. Clarify biosafety requirements for the engineered culture. Because ReLEAF supplies an engineered Bacillus subtilis culture for use in a bioreactor, the production organism must be assessed separately from the cell-free output. The Philippine Department of Science and Technology Biosafety Committee (DOST-BC) publishes guidelines covering contained-use GMO activities, including work involving microorganisms. Its published guidance also states that biosafety approval does not replace any additional permits required by other authorities. ReLEAF must therefore obtain a determination of which requirements apply to its proposed commercial operation, including culture importation or transfer, storage, containment, transport, and disposal. The published contained-use guideline is marked as under revision, so the applicable current requirements must be confirmed directly with the authorities.
3. Validate containment and product quality. Before deployment, ReLEAF should generate evidence that the bioreactor retains viable engineered cells under its intended operating conditions and that the cell-free output meets defined identity, consistency, safety, and efficacy specifications. The 0.2 μm hollow-fiber membrane is part of the containment design, but its performance must be demonstrated experimentally rather than treated as proof of complete cell retention.
4. Assess the bioreactor as equipment. The bioreactor’s pumps, sensors, electrical components, fluid-handling assembly, and any applicable pressure-related features require a separate review of relevant Philippine equipment, importation, and safety requirements. FPA product registration should not be treated as approval of the device itself.
5. Complete the required registrations before commercial sale. After confirming the applicable pathways, ReLEAF would compile the required technical documentation, test results, labeling, and other supporting evidence; obtain the necessary product registrations, permits, and business or handler licences; and establish compliant local distribution. Commercial launch should occur only after the relevant authorities have confirmed the requirements and ReLEAF has satisfied them.

ReLEAF will be pushing to expand to other Southeast Asian markets as well as the United States of America or the European Union market as mentioned in the Future Expansions of Laws and Regulations page.

Potential risks

Frequently asked questions

Farmer user manual

Attached is the Farmer-Friendly User Manual (PDF, 11 pages). For a more detailed and technical user manual, refer to the Perfusion Bioreactor page.

Conclusion