When Dr. Valerie Taylor first began researching psychiatric drugs like antidepressants, she didn’t know it would eventually lead to the founding of a startup and the development of a probiotic that targets mental illness.
“Globally, that’s what consumers and governments and industry want… Solutions that are cleaner, greener, more natural.”
Her startup, Taylored Biotherapeutics, is one of dozens of early-stage biotech companies helping grow Canada’s so-called bioeconomy, according to a new report from the not-for-profit industry group Natural Products Canada (NPC).
A professor of psychiatry at the University of Calgary and PhD scientist, Taylor began her journey to becoming a founder with research into the link between gut microbiomes and mental illnesses like bipolar disorder, anxiety, and depression.
Taylor’s initial research involved transplanting bacteria from the feces of humans suffering from depression into germ-free mice. One of very few fecal transplant studies in the world focusing on mental health, Taylor’s work showed mice exposed to the bacteria developed depressive symptoms.
“That’s not how we normally conceptualize mental illness—as something you can catch via bacteria. So, we became really interested in the reverse perspective. If we can catch illness that way, can you potentially get well doing the same sort of thing?” Taylor said.
The research eventually led Taylor to found Taylored Biotherapeutics in 2020, with a focus on developing probiotic treatments for the management and prevention of mood disorders.
The type of research behind a product like Taylor’s takes time, guidance, and money. That’s where NPC came in.
Taylor and her colleagues partnered with the federally funded biotech industry group, receiving $25,000 in early-stage financial support as well as guidance on patenting the company’s intellectual property and navigating Canadian and US regulatory frameworks.
The partnership has been fruitful, with Taylored Biotherapeutics currently closing a fundraising seed round that has netted $1.5 million. They’re also sitting on another $1 million in non-dilutive funding (capital funding that doesn’t take an equity position).
A broader ecosystem
While Taylored Biotherapeutics’ product is certainly unique, its story isn’t. The company is part of a broader ecosystem of companies backed by NPC that are generating big economic returns despite operating in a relatively niche sector.
Proof Beyond Potential, a white paper commissioned by NPC, outlined how seed capital from the nonprofit has helped generate millions in revenue and private investment across these companies.
The assessment looked at 84 companies that NPC provided funding to between 2021 and 2025. It found that those companies generated nearly $900 million in gross domestic product (GDP) contributions over the same period.
Of the 84, eight were from Alberta, and two were from Saskatchewan. Those companies include CanBiocin, a long-term NPC client developing species-related probiotics, MHCombiotic, a Calgary company tackling antimicrobial resistance, and Partake, a non-alcoholic craft brewery, to name just a few.
What is a bioeconomy, anyway?
If you’re asking yourself what the bioeconomy is, you’re not alone. Shelley King, founder and CEO of NPC, outlined the niche sector for those of us who aren’t econ nerds.
“Simply put, it’s products and technologies that are based on biology rather than traditional chemicals or petrochemicals,” King, who helped found the nonprofit in 2016, said. “That can range from AgTech to cleantech to food, functional ingredients, cosmetics, or nutritional supplements. Anything that has a biological component.”
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Globally, the bioeconomy is valued at around $4 trillion USD ($5.5 trillion CAD), according to both the World Economic Forum and the World Bioeconomy Forum, with the latter also projecting that figure to rise to $30 trillion USD by 2025.
In Canada, reporting on the scope of the bioeconomy is a little less robust, but the federal government estimated its value at around $4.2 billion CAD in 2015. In 2024, the feds projected that number to be closer to $240 billion by 2030.
“Globally, that’s what consumers and governments and industry want,” King said. “Solutions that are cleaner, greener, more natural. We all know we have a climate challenge, and that is really driving the demand globally.”
By the numbers
The results included in NPC’s paper are a testament to King’s assertion that sustainable, naturally produced goods, tech, and services are indeed a growth market. The report breaks down how GDP contributions from NPC companies grew from $67 million to $256 million over the five-year period of the study. Likewise, full-time employment supported by portfolio businesses grew from 552 to nearly 2,000 jobs.
Return on investment calculated that every dollar invested by NPC was associated with $3.10 in new company revenues, $2.70 in incremental GDP, and $52 in follow-on investment.
That last metric is among the most challenging aspects of development in the bioeconomy, according to King. The time it can take to bring a product or service to market can make early-stage private investment difficult to come by, but all the more necessary.
“It’s been clear in Canada for quite some time that early-stage investing is a critical gap,” King said. “I’m talking about the seeding stage, which is really early and where the risk is really high. It can take a long time in the biospace to actually get to market—probably four to seven years.”
Providing that early-stage, patient-focused capital has been instrumental in de-risking and opening companies up to outside private investment. As of 2025, the companies that received funding from NPC have raised $622 million in follow-on capital, with 83 percent of that coming from private investors.
Stack to the Future
If growth in the bioeconomy maintains its current pace and trajectory, the numbers coming out of NPC’s portfolio will jump over the next five years to $1.8 billion in cumulative GDP and the creation of roughly 1,200 new jobs.
But that’s not the path King said the nonprofit is actually looking to take. Instead, it’s pivoting to a new strategy based on a $35-million “capital stack” model. That allows the nonprofit to use different financial elements—like debt, equity, and non-dilutive investment—to provide flexibility suited to the needs of individual businesses.
“We want to combine all of these into one model, and that’s meant to be catalytic to a company’s growth,” King said. “We think by having flexibility around which financial instrument we use, we can make [these businesses] even more attractive to investors.”
So, what would be the difference in outcome, then? According to its forecasts, implementing the capital stack model would nearly quadruple NPC’s projections over the next five years. Under the new strategy, it predicts a cumulative GDP of $4 billion and 7,590 jobs by 2030.
BetaKit’s Prairies reporting is funded in part by YEGAF, a not-for-profit dedicated to amplifying business stories in Alberta.
Feature image courtesy Natural Products Canada.