Interview with Rayner Loi
Co-Founder of Lumitics
Singapore
By: Daniela Amitai
Food waste is one of the world’s most overlooked issues. According to TIME Magazine, there are “More than 1.2 billion tons of food lost on the world’s farms, and 900 million tons wasted in stores, restaurants and homes, accounting for 10% of global greenhouse-gas emission” (Gunia, 2021). How can we reduce food waste at hotels, airlines, stores, restaurants and homes?
Entrepreneurial leader Rayner Loi, the co-founder and CEO of Lumitics realized that food waste prevention is far more important than redistribution and recycling. While there are charities redistributing food to the needy and other companies looking at food waste recycling, Loi found that no other companies in the world are looking at food waste prevention.
Founded in 2017, Lumitics is a Singapore-based start-up that tracks food waste with artificial intelligence (AI). Co-founded by Rayner Loi and Keshav Sivakumar, Lumitics creates a solution on food waste for all stakeholders across the supply chain. Loi found that many families struggle to have less than one meal a day during his volunteering experience with under privileged communities in Singapore.
Becoming an entrepreneur two years into university, “I simply could not sit by the side and watch the world continue to be so wasteful and decided I needed to do something about it! Singapore has a great startup ecosystem in place with various programs and grants to support first time founders and so it made the decision a lot less scary,” he says.
Loi wears multiple hats on a typical day. He can be doing anything from doing sales (meeting and pitching to new prospective clients), operations (onboarding and training new clients who have implementation our solution), finance and accounting, investor relations and human resources (hiring and training people).
Just a few years in business, Loi shared, “I think many aspiring entrepreneurs make the mistake of thinking they need all the skills before they start a company. The reality is if you need all the skills before starting your own company, you will never start one.” Loi’s advice for emerging entrepreneurs is to:
· Find team members who complement you (in skill sets) and not compliment you.
· Figure out your why!
Today, Lumitics works with clients such as the Four Seasons hotel in Singapore and Etihad Airways and is planning to expand to work with more hotels, airlines, stores and restaurants in the near future.
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