TurtleTree Labs, a Singapore-based milk start-up, walked away with first prize of $500,000 in cash at the world's biggest start-up pitch competition in Saudi Arabia.

The biotech firm is the world’s first to create milk sustainably using animal cell-based technology.

TurtleTree, supported by the Singapore government and backed by Saudi venture capital KBW Ventures, won the Entrepreneurship World Cup 2020, hosted by the Misk Global Forum in Riyadh on Monday.

Prince Khaled bin Alwaleed, founder and CEO, KBW Ventures told Zawya that the start-up had pitched hard during the knockout round of the Entrepreneurship World Cup.

“They were up against really strong business models with innovative problem-solving approaches; that being said their market potential matched with their proprietary technology sealed the winning round for them. As an investor, I was incredibly proud to see TurtleTree win in Saudi’s most prestigious startup event,” he said.

In July, the cellular agriculture start-up had won the first prize at the Temasek Liveability Challenge. In addition to the $1 million from the Temasek Foundation, TurtleTree was granted $100,000 in investment funding and a spot in the Antler accelerator program from Planet Rise.

(Reporting by Anoop Menon; editing by Seban Scaria)

(anoop.menon@refinitiv.com)

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