Craft Beer Insights: 5 Questions with Alan Edwards & Thanit Apipatana

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Photo by Bohdan Stocek on Unsplash

THAILAND – 1 March 2024 – Life Below Labs is a liquid yeast company—possibly the first in South East Asia—catering to small and microbreweries, home brewers, as well as wineries and distilleries. The firm’s microbiology lab specialises in freshly propagated yeast, banking, and culturing its colonies in-house. Liquid, as opposed to dry yeast, is said to make a better craft beer. The seed capital for the startup came from venture investor Thanit Apipatana, who has known its founder Alan Edwards since their school days and still is an adviser today.

Edwards tells us what triggered him to start the project and how this could revolutionise the craft beer industry.

What’s the secret about this product and how do you stand out in the market?

Yeast is the key component to making beer and is responsible for most of the flavor-active
compounds. There are thousands of strains available both naturally and through natural selection by brewers over the years. Newer tools in molecular genetics now enable us to custom-design strains. There are endless possibilities for creating different flavours which give the beers their personality.

Liquid yeast is superior to dry yeast and that has to do with the cell wall structure where you have most of the proteins responsible for the transport of the flavor compounds. The manufacturing process of dry yeast crumbles up and damages the cell wall and the rehydration process won’t be able to recover all those transport proteins. There are some disadvantages of the liquid product. Breweries need to keep it refrigerated and the shelf life is not that long, so you have to organise the distribution differently. But the better variety of flavors should make up for that. This is a relatively new thing for the craft beer market that I’m trying to spearhead in Thailand first and then hopefully regionally once we have size and scale.

How do you see the perspective for the craft beer industry, especially in a country like Thailand?

Thailand has restrictive laws on alcohol production and sales, but nowadays, the political attitude and public views on the topic are quickly changing. There is much more general awareness about the diverse options when it comes to alcoholic beverages and both producers and consumers are shifting gears to focus more on quality.

This is very exciting to me as the purpose of Life Below Labs is to provide producers—and hobbyists—with the knowledge and tools needed to craft premium products and elevate the whole experience.
The Thai beer market has so far been dominated by two major players. There has been a very low craft beer presence and very limited homebrew market interest before. But people have started to understand and see the global trends. Craft beer is now making a significant impact on the beer market as a whole and starting to gain more market share. Consumers are also increasingly aware of the quality when they compare it to mass-produced beers.

How did you enter the business and what motivated you?

While growing up I travelled to the UK annually to visit family and on weekends my Dad would sometimes take me with him to the pub. That’s where I gained exposure to the culture. When I was 10 years old, we went to the London Science Museum where the fascinating world of microbiology caught my attention. I learned that yeast is a living organism that can be used to raise bread and produce numerous fermented foods and beverages.

My mother, a food scientist, further piqued my interest about the constituents of food, and what makes up the various tastes and aromas. I started brewing beer as a hobby and slowly began to understand in detail how to develop and refine the tastes and aromas of beer. I began to collect yeast strains and built my own microbiology lab for beer. From there came the idea to provide brewers with the tools to not just make beer but to make best-selling beers.

What are other potential markets you are looking at?

Singapore would be a first choice for the next step given that there already exist quite a few microbreweries. Vietnam is an interesting country with an active craft beer market and lots of breweries. There are many brewers in Cambodia providing OEM work for producers in Thailand. OEM breweries servicing the craft beer market are also potential customers for us.

There are not that many specialised labs in existence right now within this region. To succeed in the market, you need a very deep understanding in microbiology and a lot of highly specialised equipment. You need a lot of time to sort out the R&D process and to make sure that you can produce a product that can perform consistently.

The market potential? If you ask the breweries, probably 9 out of 10 will say that liquid yeast is better. It’s something that people within the industry know. The end consumers are less aware of the difference. They just want good beer, right? But we are not selling to end consumers. We are selling to the breweries.

How’s the progress with regards to the official launch of Life Below Labs?

The launch of Life Below Labs will happen towards the end of Q2 this year. We are currently setting up the internal processes and procedures and finalizing details of the production process. Construction work is ongoing and the lab will be ready in time for the launch.

About Life Below Labs:

A microbiology lab specializing in freshly propagated yeast. We culture all our colonies in-house, with love and care.

For more information, please contact:
Life Below Labs: alan@lifebelowlabs.com

This press release was published as it was received from our partner, without any editing from the Tech in Asia team.

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