Damir Perkic is working on the plastic water bottle of the future with his start-up BE O Bottle

How do you ensure that your start-up grows into a successful mature company? Poelmann van den Broek helps you with the legal issues. In our section #Startupsanddowns, you can read real-life stories. Damir Perkic talks about his company BE O Bottle, which develops reusable plastic products made from renewable resources such as sugar cane, cassava and algae.

Damir himself worked for a time in the plastics industry. So he knows better than anyone else how this industry works. When he started BE O Bottle, he listed for himself the three most important challenges in the plastics industry. Top of the list: that fossil oil has been used for plastic for more than 60 years. The second major challenge is the ever-increasing "plastic soup" in the oceans, and the third is the lack of recycling of plastic (less than 10% is reused). With those challenges concretized and a bucket of experience under his belt, he started BE O Bottle.

Damir's start-up in brief

With BE O Bottle, Damir and his associate Wouter Moekotte produce water bottles made of 94% bioplastic, from Brazilian sugarcane. The bottle has a capacity of 500 ml and is modular, so it takes up less space when empty and can be easily cleaned. BE O stands for be circular(be - o, that is). BE O Bottle bottles are 100% recyclable. In addition, they can simply be put in the dishwasher. The bottles will soon be available in (online) stores. Companies can order them starting from 40 pieces and can then have their own logo printed on the cap.

Looking for investors

"BE O Bottle started with a crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter," Damir explains. "But eventually it turned out that a really large amount of money was needed to get off to a good start. I had put in an amount myself, of course, but more was needed. That's why I started looking for investors. Eventually I found two investors operating under one name. With them I made clear agreements that were neatly put down on paper. We signed a letter of intent and an official contract in which everything was laid down. Unfortunately, things went wrong with those investors. Agreements that were simply laid down were not kept."

Assistance from Poelmann van den Broek

Because it all went so smoothly, B EO Bottle suffered a big dent in the start-up phase. "The investors were supposed to invest a certain amount of money and would get a certain share in the company in return," Damir continues. "Since that investment ended up not going through but costs had already been incurred, the company valuation went down significantly. Poelmann van den Broek is a partner of StartUp Nijmegen. Through StartUp Nijmegen, I came into contact with a lawyer from Poelmann van den Broek at the time. He was my legal partner in the process. We fully discussed the situation and I made my wishes known. He not only advised me very well, but also stepped forward as a lawyer. Thanks in part to his intervention, we were ultimately able to reach a settlement."

Wouter as a new companion

During this whole process, Wouter Moekotte stepped into the company as co-founder. "He also invested and could so agree with the philosophy of BE O Bottle that he became my associate," Damir says. "Now that the legal process is complete, we can look to the future again."

Future Vision

If it's up to Damir, it won't stop at bottles. "Eventually, we want to offer a complete range of reusable products, all made from sustainable, renewable resources. But first, of course, the water bottle. Once that's fully established and selling well, we'll move on to the next step."