Partner blog feature: Creating an experience around food

Feb 13, 2024

Laura Virginillo’s company, Modern General Food Group, traces its origins to a 1,400 square foot bakery in Vancouver, where she started out offering fresh baking, handcrafted coffee and drinks and unique pantry staples. Like so many others, the pandemic caused her to change course and Virginillo began producing her own products.

Following a move to Ontario in 2021, she’s also been building a wholesale business where she develops, manufactures and sells unique food products under her own brand name. Innovation is key for her when she’s developing recipes or packaged products and looking for better ways to do things.

Learn more about Laura’s journey in an article by the Small Scale Food Processors Association, a Bioenterprise Canada industry partner.

Click here to see more...

Video: Democratizing Gene Editing - Pairwise’s Vision for the Future of Agriculture

Pairwise has built its business around an idea that runs counter to how many companies approach innovation: make transformative technology easier to access.

In this Seed World interview, CEO Tom Adams discusses why broader access to gene editing could speed crop improvement, expand innovation opportunities and help agriculture address emerging challenges. He explains why Pairwise believes no single company can solve all of agriculture's problems alone—and why making advanced breeding technologies available to more organizations could accelerate progress across the industry.

The conversation explores how consumer trust influences technology adoption, why innovations like pitless cherries and seedless blackberries matter beyond convenience, and how future crop improvements could help address labor shortages, automation, harvest efficiency and other production challenges. Adams also shares his perspective on what the industry may be underestimating about the next wave of gene editing innovation.

Watch the full interview to hear why Pairwise believes agriculture is approaching an important inflection point for gene editing, and why the pace of innovation over the next decade could surprise the industry.

Topics Covered:

o Democratizing agricultural innovation

o Consumer trust and technology adoption

o The business case for sharing innovation

o Expanding innovation beyond major crops

o Next-generation breeding technologies