Danone aiming to scale up precision fermentation with aid of partners

French dairy giant Danone is teaming up on a project to invest in precision fermentation.

It is joining forces with local industrial heavyweight Michelin, best known for its tyre production, local investment bank Crédit Agricole and the American start-up DMC Biotechnologies. The Biotech Open Platform initiative aims to foster the development of healthier products.

The goal of the project announced today (13 June) is to scale up precision fermentation – a process that enables the creation of bio-sourced materials and ingredients for industry innovation and to tackle decarbonisation.

Some €16m ($17.3m) will be invested in the first stage at a location in Clermont-Ferrand within the Parc Cataroux Center for Sustainable Materials, an innovation accelerator supported by Michelin.

Precision fermentation uses microorganisms like bacteria, yeast or fungi to produce proteins, enzymes and other molecules. It has been linked to innovation in the agri-food and materials sectors. Danone suggested the process is the potential solution to many of the issues facing the food industry.

The Activia yogurt maker described itself as a category leader in ferments and suggests it has the largest ferment library in the world, with 4,000 identified.

The ambition behind the Biotech Open Platform project is to scale up products and processes already tested in the laboratory and, by 2025, to install an initial demo-scale production line, including a fermenter and purification equipment.

Additional equipment will be installed in the following years, including a second production line.

DMC develops and produces chemicals and ingredients using precision fermentation. Its proprietary technology platform, Dynamic Metabolic Control, is said to make fermentation more standardised, robust and predictable.

The main distinction between precision fermentation and fermentation is that the microorganisms used in precision fermentation are designed to create a particular end product. One food-specific application of precision fermentation is the production of chymosin, a type of rennet that is used to make cheese.

Just Food