Chris Yip  0:02  
Welcome to Tell Me More: Coffee with Chris Yip, the official podcast of the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering at the University of Toronto. Each month, I sit down with someone from our vibrant global community to talk about what places them at the heart of designing bold solutions for a better world. You'll meet alumni, students and professors who are making a difference across a range of fields, including some where you may not expect to find them.

My guest today is alumnus, Sofia Bonilla, who completed her PhD in our Department of Chemical Engineering & Applied Chemistry, having previously completed degrees in microbiology and environmental science. Her thesis focused on protein production, and she has since leveraged that experience to become the founder and CEO of Alt-Pro, a company that is creating the next generation of pet food with clean and sustainable ingredients from insects, algae and fungi. Sofia, welcome to the podcast.

Sofia Bonilla  1:03  
Thanks so much for having me. Excited to be here.

Chris Yip  1:05  
Yeah, looking forward to this conversation, because this is so cool. I introduce you as doing your PhD in engineering, but your undergrad and other degrees were clearly not in engineering; microbiology and environmental science. So give me the whole story. How did, how did that all develop? And then how did you end up at U of T engineering?

Sofia Bonilla  1:27  
Yeah, yeah. Well, it's a long story, but I'll try to keep it short. So I, I'm from Colombia. I did my bachelor's in Colombia in microbiology, and I remember very clearly when I was looking at, what did we, you know, I would pursue at the time, and I had no idea. The only thing that I knew was that I liked chemistry, and my brother was in this university in Colombia and so the idea was that we would both go to this university that is, you know, very prestigious and so it was a good opportunity to go to. And so when I looked at programs, there were two programs that caught my attention. One was chemical engineering, and the other was microbiology. And I was like, which one should I pick? I have no idea. My brother was doing industrial engineering and so it was like everyone around me was like, oh, engineering is so cool, but I was 16 years old, I had no idea about anything, and the only thing that I saw was microbiology had more chemistries than chemical engineering because it had biochemistry, and that's the reason why I studied microbiology, and I loved it. I loved it. I loved the idea, like, as I learned, I loved the idea of using microbes and using biology to solve problems, and particularly environmental problems. At the time in Colombia, microbiology was very into, like, medical more, you know, like typical lab. So people would ask me, like, what would you do? And I'm like, I don't really know, but I love what I'm learning and so when I finished my degree, I realized that there wasn't a lot of opportunity in Colombia to use microbiology to solve environmental issues, and then I had the opportunity to go into a master's in Australia, actually. So I did my Master's in Sydney, in the University of New South Wales in Australia, so in environmental science. And so that was really interesting and exciting, just living, you know, in another country, and learning. And in that experience, I was, I ended up doing a research project where I was using microbes to solve environmental problems, so specifically where we're looking for microbes that would degrade oil in sea water. So that was kind of my research project and I loved it. I loved research so much. And so I was like, oh, I had no idea that I had this, you know, this passion and, like, ability to do research. And so that was that. And then, for personal reasons, I moved to Canada. My boyfriend, at the time, had moved here. So we're like, deciding, oh, it's going to be Australia or Canada. Where would we leave? So we were engaged at the time, so we decided it would be Canada. So I was like, Oh, I loved doing research in in, you know, in my masters, and I looked for online, you know, professors that were doing similar research and departments, and that's what led me to Chem Eng, to chemical engineering at U of T so I remember I visited. There was like a seminar where professors were presenting their research and so I connected with Grant Allen, who would be my supervisor. And I think Edgar Acosta, Professor Edgar Acosta, Professor Elisabeth Edwards, so that was all not the intersection of biology, environment and now engineering, even though that was in my background, yeah.

Chris Yip  5:10  
One of the things I always thought was fascinating, and I don't know when I got told this maybe, was I was an undergrad in Chem Eng, was just sort of look at a cell or a microbe, right? It's basically a chemical factory on its own, right? It's all running process, input, outputs. So you could argue that you were doing Chem Eng during your microbiology undergrad, so I'm just gonna, I'm gonna put a plug in there that that's actually what you were doing. You just didn't realize it at the time, right?

Sofia Bonilla  5:36  
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think there are, like, a lot of similarities, especially if we're talking about biochemical, you know, engineering, bioprocessing, like, there is really a lot that intersects, you know, biology and engineering.

Chris Yip  5:49  
Can you give people a sense of sort of the potential of biomass? I mean, the value proposition of algae. I mean, I know anyone owns a pool or has seen a lake, you see this sort of green mass that sort of floating around. It's like, oh, I got to clean that out of my my filters. But there's a value to that too, right?

Sofia Bonilla  6:09  
Yeah. So what you mentioned made me think about, you know, the idea of using nature to solve like problems. And I think that's that's really the rationale for using microorganisms to in my case, or solve environmental issues in and so to the just going back to the micro algae and maybe other, you know, alternative sources of biomass. In our case, we're really interested in the nutritional profile. So when we took, when we look at, you know, how we feed our animals, or we feed ourselves, like we're really relying on, I don't know it's like a weird number, but it's like 50 crops, like all humans use, like these small amount of crops that you know, this is how agriculture was industrialized, and so now we all rely on these ingredients to provide all the nutrients. But if we look at nature like there are just so so many options, micro algae, fungi, bacteria, other animals, plants and and so I think it's just really interesting to see the potential of diversifying where we get nutrients and there is also, like, to me, was very exciting when I started thinking about these and look at the nutritional profile of some of these, you know, alternative sources, and see, like, how nutrient rich they are compared to other things that we use now and so it's like a no brainer, why aren't we looking at alternative sources to find the nutrients that we know animals, pets and humans need.

Chris Yip  7:51  
For our listeners, I mean, how do you, you know, if I take algae or seaweed, how do I get what I want out of it? Like, if I want a specific protein, like, what are the advantages for getting proteins from this source?

Sofia Bonilla  8:05  
Yeah, so, I mean, there are, there are different use cases for these ingredients. So I'll talk specifically about the way that we look at it for our ingredients, and specifically for the novel ingredient that we're developing, which is micro algae based, you can look at different species of microalgae or seaweed, and then identify, you know, different nutritional profiles that are needed for different products. So in our case, we were really interested in protein. So we wanted to have a strain that had a good protein content, but we also wanted some extra nutrients that are very scarce in non animal sources. Yeah. So what makes it special is that it has complete protein, so all the amino acids in the right quantities comparable to chicken and beef but more importantly, has other nutrients that are very specific to pet health, taurine, which is a free amino acid, and arachidonic acid, which is a fatty acid and Omega six. So these nutrients are essential for pets. They're actually used in a lot of other applications, like infant formula, supplements, Red Bull has taurine. So like a lot of a lot of different applications, and so that's what makes it a really interesting ingredient with a with a unique nutritional profile. And what we're doing is, just as a starting point, we want to use the whole biomass. So we're not going to fractionate or extract these nutrients. We're going to use these whole biomass in our pet food formulas.

Chris Yip  9:44  
So, okay, so you're doing your PhD, you're happily in the lab, you're working for Grant, you're doing your wastewater flocks and it's like, what point did you go I can make food out of wastewater? Where did that, when did that pop into your head?

Sofia Bonilla  10:00  
I was always interested in entrepreneurship. So my mom was, you know, is a single mom, had her own company so I saw that growing up, and I understood early on the like, the positive impact that businesses can have in the economy, like in socially, etc. so I was very curious about that. I actually did an entrepreneurship for engineers course during my PhD, and TAed for that course too. But in terms of the research I finished my PhD, I did my postdoc at U of T and then I left and did a postdoc in in the Netherlands. And so that's like just thinking about proteins for so long, since my PhD, postdoc one, postdoc two. So I had a long time to really think about proteins and just understanding, you know, what the problems, the actual problems were in the world today, and so I realized that we need to diversify where we get proteins, where we get nutrients and how can I use my training, my knowledge, to solve for that? And so it did take some time for me to realize where my place would be in contributing to the solution, and what that will look like. But it, yeah, it was like a definitely, like 10 years you process.

Chris Yip  11:31  
So, but in the food space, so, so why pet food versus sort of human food?

Sofia Bonilla  11:37  
Yeah, like many, many things, to be honest. So the early idea was, the problem was, how do we diversify feed and food protein? And so when I started thinking about that and understanding, you know, the market, the opportunity, then I looked at different options. One was human, one was animal feed, and then pet food. And so with pet food, I had the aha moment, because pets obviously don't have the social, cultural barriers that humans have with, you know, their food like, it's very precious for humans. It's such a like, a social, cultural thing, so very difficult to change. Pets don't have that. And the opportunity that I saw in pets was around this formulation too. Like, when you think about pet food, you have to provide all the nutrients that pets need in one product. So there is an opportunity to, you know, mix different nutrients and then just provide, like, solve the puzzle, and then you, you provide it. Well, that's not for humans. You we don't need one thing every day. So, so that was what started, you know, getting me into pet food. And then later on, as I started talking to customers, there is this issue with pets today, that is, they have a lot of allergies to traditional animal proteins. So a lot of allergies to chicken, to beef fish. So there is a lot of demand for novel proteins in the pet food space that aligns very well with our solution.

Chris Yip  13:11  
Yeah. So how do you I mean, I think of pet food, I think of, IAMS, right? I think of the big players. How do you differentiate your product then?

Sofia Bonilla  13:20  
Yeah, I think that we found a good space was in these hypoallergenic, protein value proposition and then the functionality of our products. So, you know, during the pandemic, a lot of people decided to bring pets home. And the whole idea of having pets, you know, maybe 20/30 years ago, it was like, oh, yes, that's a pet, right? Like, they live in the house, but they're a pet. Now, dogs and cats are family members, and so people are really interested in giving the best they can and so that's where we come in. Firstly, when, when the pet has an allergy, where the dog has an allergy to chicken, beef or fish, and it's surprising, because I didn't know these before getting into this industry, and it seems to be something that is actually growing in recent years and it's about 35% of pet parents are looking for a new protein for their dog because they have some kind of skin issue or gastrointestinal issue that they need to address, and then the second was a functionality. So we formulate our products, not only to for the sake of giving them, I don't know, insect protein or micro algae, but really thinking about the nutrients that are going to have a beneficial effect on the health of the of the petswe have. Prebiotics, like a formula with extra prebiotics we have a formula with extra omega threes that supports skin and coat. So it's, it's going beyond, you know, the basics and really using what we know about nutritional science and like ingredient science and protein science to provide benefits to their pets.

Chris Yip  14:01  
You talked about entrepreneurship. I mean, you talked about earlier that you've always had an interest in entrepreneurship, right? And this was this really gave the impetus. What sort of resources did you find at U of T that were helpful for this, or if there weren't any, what should we have here that that could help you out better?

Sofia Bonilla  15:24  
Yeah, no, I've had, I have, like, a lot of support from U of T. I actually they when I decided to start what is now Alt-Pro, the first I was in my mat leave, so second mat leave, middle of COVID and the first place that I looked for support was U of T, and I joined an incubator. ICUBE at UTM. 

Chris Yip  15:49  
Oh, right, right, right.

Sofia Bonilla  15:50  
Yeah, because I live in Mississauga, so I have my baby, it was just closer, you know, middle of COVID. So that was the first support that I had and it allowed me to, know ideate and like, really get into know what market research looks like, business etc. I have also used UTEST, so UTEST the accelerator has been great support and they're actually invested in our company too. So that's exciting. And I continue to have you know, U of T support. I, for example, Grant. My PhD supervisor is an advisor in our company too.

Chris Yip  16:28  
There you go. I think what's interesting is, like, like, as you went through that sort of list of entities on campus, I think it really reflects that the university doesn't have a one location do entrepreneurship, right? You've got multiple locations, multiple philosophies, multiple perspectives, right? You have this, I don't know, a constellation of of startup entities that that people can just jump into, and they're not really restricted by discipline or background or whatever. It's just really about the science or the idea that you're trying to translate, right?

Sofia Bonilla  16:59  
Exactly, exactly. And I think, you know, looking back, I've seen like so many different like at different times in this journey, we've needed different types of support and so having, as you say, that access to different expertise, different network, even, and they're still connected somehow, it's really helpful, because we can come in and ask, you know, like I'm looking to do, I don't know market research about something, or I don't know enough about IP, help me, and then they can look for that support within the different incubators, accelerators at U of T and I, yeah, I honestly have only thing positive things to say, not because I'm on the podcast with you (laughs).

Chris Yip  17:47  
No, it's all good (laughs).

Sofia Bonilla  17:49  
No and I really do, do speak highly of U of T in general in my experience.

Chris Yip  17:55  
I was gonna say, when people think of startups, you think of like, oh, it's this big operation, but you're, you're, it's a small operation, right? It's not a it's, you're not like 100 person company, right? You're only...

Sofia Bonilla  18:05  
We're six, yeah, yeah. So we're a team of six and, yeah, I think, I mean, people have different ideas of what startups look like. I think if you have 100 you know, 100 person team, you're probably not a startup anymore (laughs). But I do, I do see, like a lot of, you know, companies that are, in my opinion, relatively large, called startups. Yeah. I mean, it's been, it's been a really interesting journey for me, coming from, you know, academia, science, research, going into leading a team and building a company, especially with, you know, a lot of retail like CPG we have, but we're also doing R and D for our ingredient. So a lot of learning along the way, definitely different skills that I didn't have when I, when I, you know, finished my my life in in research. So that's, that's honestly, what keeps me going, is, is like that opportunity to learn, because it's same as I often say, it's extremely hard, but it's so rewarding to have the opportunity to learn about like, what seem trivial things, but what, actually, you know, makes the world work, and how we make purchasing decisions and how we so? So, yes, I'm excited to be in this position right now.

Chris Yip  19:35  
So I understand, like your so your R&D team is, it's not in Toronto. It's not in Mississauga, though, right?

Sofia Bonilla  19:40  
No, it's in Halifax, actually.

Chris Yip  19:42  
Okay. And we're, this is a bit of a show, a shameless commercial plug, where, where are is Alt-Pro sold? Where can I? Where could a pet owner get it?

Sofia Bonilla  19:53  
So we're in 96 stores right now. I think 97 today, if I read the report correctly (laugh).

Chris Yip  19:59  
You know what's going on.

Sofia Bonilla  20:01  
Yeah, so we're in a grocery now in the majority of our stores are grocery stores, and they were in a few vet clinics. So healthy planet is one of our, of our largest accounts here in Ontario, in BC, we have Choices Market, Spud, so that's where you can find our products. We just launched on Amazon.ca. so you can also find us on Amazon, on our website. And we're, yeah, we're going the least day by day. So we expect to be in 500 stores by the, by the fall, and that's where, that's where we have our sales pipeline.

Chris Yip  20:41  
You said 500 stores?

Sofia Bonilla  20:43  
Yeah.

Chris Yip  20:44  
And is it, this is, this is across Canada? Are you, are you around, like international?

Sofia Bonilla  20:49  
Across Canada.

Chris Yip  20:50  
Across Canada only, so that your market right now is just Canadian market.

Sofia Bonilla  20:53  
Yes, yeah.

Chris Yip  20:54  
And so the R&D is in Halifax, is production in Halifax, and packaging, all that stuff in Halifax as well? Or where is that all done?

Sofia Bonilla  21:01  
So we work with manufacturers in Ontario and Quebec. 

Chris Yip  21:05  
Okay.

Sofia Bonilla  21:06  
Yeah, so that's where we produce our products and package our products. We have a national distributor, and so we send product to warehouses in the east and the west, and then from there, it gets distributed across the stores. The products that we have currently are only for dogs. We have three different formats. So we have dog food, you know, dry kibble, and for treats, we have two different formats. One is oven baked biscuits, which is a dry product and then we also have two formulas of soft chews. So these are, like semi moist, like smaller treats.

Chris Yip  21:49  
So what's the five-year timeline for Alt-Pro? I mean, you talked about within a year, you're going to go from 90 what, 97 stores to 500. What's like...your goal to take on the IAMS of the world and...?

Sofia Bonilla  22:04  
Yeah, why not? I mean, we see a huge opportunity in the alternative protein, pet food space. I think it's an emerging segment. It's still in its infancy, but we see a lot of signs of growth in that segment so I think we have a big opportunity to become leaders in that segment. So that will be, you know, part of our focus is really growing in Canada and internationally. So the US, Mexico and other countries are definitely we're like, it's in our pipeline. We're really evaluating which one makes more sense and when, and they're really developing our ingredient too, because the novel ingredient that we're developing, it's still, you know, R&D. So we do want to get to the point where we commercialize it and include it in our products, and also in other in other types of products, not only pet food, but human food, infant formula, aquaculture feed. So that's where we see application for our ingredients. So we now we're excited. I mean, there is a lot to do, for sure, but there is a lot of potential.

Chris Yip  23:17  
How do you do like I can imagine how you know, human food or drink testing you select an audience, and you do, like, a blind taste test and all that sort of stuff. What do you do with like, a dog?

Sofia Bonilla  23:30  
Yeah, yeah. So it's called, actually, it's called a palatability test. So there are different ways of doing it. I think traditionally, they've been done with dogs in lab, which is not something that we that we do. So we essentially just try our products with different dogs and just see what the acceptability rate is. We do want to be, you know, over 80% and actually our products are over 90% acceptability rate, which is something that we are very proud of. Because, yeah, if the dog likes it, you know that's the first barrier.

Chris Yip  24:07  
Right. Do you have, do you have test dogs? You have, like, this dog, I know he'll, he'll eat anything. This one? No, she like...

Yeah, and that's, it's absolutely true what you're saying. Because even within our team. I mean, our team has dogs, and then, like extended family, friends have dogs, we have a customer base so when we have we're launching a product, we're like, okay, can we send you a sample? But it's true that some dogs eat anything, and some dogs are very picky and so you do want to create a product that will satisfy, as I said at least 80% but anything higher, obviously is better. We joke in our in our team, because my dog is not picky at all, and he's like a giant goof, and it's everything except products from any competitors. Mentally, he knows he needs to remain loyal. So, yes, Snoopy is not a good taste tester, like it tastes everything with him, but we don't trust his judgment.

Your career trajectory, it was like, I've got you've got family members are engineers so you diverted into microbiology, environmental science. You went down the path of a graduate degree in Australia and a PhD in Toronto, then two different postdocs. Now you're an entrepreneur being successful, and say, this is, this is a very cool success story. What advice do you have for people interested in going down this path? Any advice for people?

Sofia Bonilla  25:37  
Oh, yeah, it's, hard. I usually don't like to give advice, because I feel that everyone has like a different journey. For me, it was, it was always very clear that I wanted to contribute positively in any way that I could. And when I was doing research, that's that was my motivation and focus, and when I realized that I could contribute differently, using my scientific training to bring products that would solve a problem, but specifically for pets right now, but also contribute to the solution of a larger problem, which is the feed and food, reliance on animal nutrients, petroleum based nutrients. I think just finding like a good motivation, a good why, has been important. Because, as I've mentioned, the journeys is really hard, and so there has to be a very strong reason why you do it and and it's not, is that how you know it looks in the magazines like it's not really about money? Is that it's not, I don't think you would do what we do for money. More than that.

Chris Yip  26:55  
I think it's more it's all about, I think being passionate about it, right?

Sofia Bonilla  26:59  
Yeah and if I say something, I want to say something else about, you know, like the journey, like the skill set, even though I don't use my scientific training as much on an everyday basis right now, one of the things that I realized in business and entrepreneurship, is that we're always testing. We're always doing experiments. And so having that mindset from our my previous life has been really helpful in terms of keeping us, you know, focused on, what's our What's the objective for these and what can we do to test our assumptions? And if it doesn't work, then, you know, try something different and test again. So I think that helps keeps things manageable and more logical, too. Because I think, you know, in engineering and science, like you do want to have a good framework for decision making, and that's helpful I find right now for me.

Chris Yip  28:05  
Awesome. This has been an absolutely fascinating conversation. I love being able to tie that sort of microbiology, engineering and just in a very different context. I think this is exciting. So wish you all the best with Alt-Pro. I think this is a terrific story. Looking forward to hearing how all this works.

Sofia Bonilla  28:24  
Yeah. Thank you so much for having me, and it was, it was great talking to you.

Chris Yip  28:29  
Thanks again for listening to Tell Me More: Coffee with Chris Yip. If you want to catch up on past episodes and to make sure you don't miss the next one, please subscribe. We're on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and more, just look for Coffee with Chris Yip. You can also check out @UofTengineering on Facebook, Instagram, X and LinkedIn for more stories about how our community is building a better world. And finally, if you'd be inspired to join us, we'd love to welcome you. If you're thinking of taking a degree or working with us on our research projects, you can find us online engineering.utoronto.ca or you can visit our beautiful campus in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. I hope I can join you for coffee soon.