Episode 29: Building Better Nutrition: A Systems View on Innovation, Sustainability & Functionality In Partnership with PFX Biotech

Welcome to the Protein Production Technology International Podcast. We explore the latest advancements in alternative proteins from cultured meats to plant-based proteins. We talk to experts and innovators who are working towards a more sustainable, efficient, and kind protein system. Join us as we dive into the exciting possibilities of the alternative protein industry. Hello everyone and a very warm welcome to today's session. Building better nutrition, a systems view on innovation, sustainability, and functionality. It's great to have so many people here with us once again. Before diving in, let me quickly explain who we are and what we do. Protein Production Technology International is a digital platform that brings together stakeholders across the entire alternative proteins value chain. From groundbreaking research to the shelves of your local store and every step in between. We provide this connection through a variety of channels, daily news updates, we can use letters, webinars and podcasts, our quarterly B2B magazine, and of course our international conferences and exhibitions. Speaking of which, mark your calendars for the future of protein production, answer them, happening on the 29th and 30th of October 2025, at right answer them in the Netherlands. The first 50 speakers have just been announced and the preliminary agenda will be out soon. If you're interested in getting involved as a speaker, exhibit or attendee, head over to our website at www.featureapproachingproduction.com to get in touch. Now, on to today's topic. As we all know, the global food system is undergoing a pretty significant transformation. What was once a conversation about simple ingredients substitution has evolved into something far more complex and far more exciting. Nutrition today isn't just about what we add or remove, it's about how we design food systems from the ground up to support human health, planetary wellbeing and commercial success. So today's session is what builds around the idea that siloed thinking no longer serves us. We need to be thinking in systems, linking sustainability metrics with nutrient density, aligning processing technologies with consumer expectations, and building products that are not just viable, but valuable on every level. So over the next hour or so, I'll be speaking with a brilliant cross-section of scientists, innovators and strategists, each bringing the different lens to the table. Together we'll explore how cross-functional thinking can unlock smarter decisions across formulation, scale-up and commercialisation. So whether you're tuned in to better understand precision fermentation, clean label innovation, or how to connect with purpose driven consumers, we hope this session gives you a fresh insights and a few practical takeaways to bring back to your own work. Now for everybody tuning in just a quick reminder, we're hoping to have some time for your questions today. Please do use the Q&A tab on the right hand side of your screen to submit them. I'll do my best to either take them towards the end of the session, or if appropriate during the discussion itself. If possible, try to avoid posting questions in the general chat, as I may well miss them. And before we get into the panel discussion, though, we're going to have a very short presentation from Ali Osman at PFX Biotech. So Ali, do you want to get us started? Thanks so much, Nick, for the nice introduction. Thank you for introducing myself as well. Good morning and good afternoon, everybody, depending wherever you are in the ward. It's my pleasure to be here in this webinar with you. So I'm just going to get a couple of minutes on. I just introduced the topic to you. My name is Ali Osman, I'm a founder and CEO of PFX Biotech, which is a pioneering stock up in precision fermentation and engineering biology to produce bioactive proteins for the advanced nutrition segments. Aiming to make food healthier, more nutritious, and better aligned with future needs. Specifically in technologies that are really maturing to become mainstream in the coming years, system thinking is very important and crucial for success. Linear thinking in food innovation focuses obviously on direct cause effect, often missing broader impact and insights in the innovation cycle. However, system thinking considers the interconnectivities and the interdependencies between different elements, ecological, economic, social, etc. With enabling technology specifically like precision fermentation, system thinking reveals value across the entire value chain and the entire supply chain, driving more resilient, scalable, and responsible food innovation. So food systems, our food system thinking basically relies on understanding complex interplay between different factors. In a case of developing a novel or a new ingredient, there are plenty of factors that actually interact with each other. That ranges from, for example, ingredient innovation to the choice of processing technologies to all the matrices going to sustainability, consumer behavior, customer acceptance, regulatory pathways, cultural dimensions, you name it. It's so important in technologies like precision fermentation and other innovative technologies to really embed system thinking in the development cycles of these ingredients. The reason is that actually great innovation will only succeed and last when it is viable, when it is feasible, when it is desirable by market, by customers, by consumers, and when it is responsible, when it's the better responsibility to align with values like sustainability, climate change, thinking health and nutrition further to the innovation. The success factors of precision fermentation to bring novel and new ingredients that are more nutritious, more sustainable to the food system is a complex journey. As you see in the slides here, there are plenty of factors that interact with each other, not just in a linear manner, but really in a very complex matrix to define what is success. And by success here, I do mean actually the lasting success, not just scale up or product launch, but the product that will be launched and last successfully in the market to make the destruction, to make the changes that we all strive to achieve. To truly unlock the potential of precision fermentation and other key enabling technologies, collaboration is a key to actually achieve the goal in changing the food system. And by collaboration, we mean all key players in that large food ecosystem, from startups to corporates, to policy makers, to universities, research centers, customers, and consumer organizations, et cetera, et cetera. By this, I just want to come to actually close the slide by saying, my call today is really to ask everybody in the ecosystem to collaborate deeply, to make that change that we all as innovators, scientists, and as humans want to achieve to make our food system more sustainable, healthier, and more nutritious. Thank you. Thanks, Ali, for that opener. I think you highlighted perfectly the critical balance between what is viable, feasible, responsible, and desirable, as you said, which are reconcets the right tone for our discussion on building better nutrition through systems thinking. Before we get into that, though, let's have some very, very quick introductions, Annie. We already know you. So let's go with ladies first. Diana, would you like to get us going? Hi, everyone, morning. Thanks for the invitation to be here. My name is Diana Liveda. I am head of R&D and co-founder of the FX biotech together with Ali, bringing innovation to a brighter nutritious food. And Amy. Amy, I work for the good feeders to Europe. We're in nonprofit and theme tank who will work to support protein diversification and was sustainable food systems through that. And I head up our nutrition work and have recently published and co-authored a guide in response in collaboration with the Physicians Association Nutrition on plant-based meat and total freshness foods. We'll be talking about that shortly. Annie. Hi, everybody. Good day. I'm Annie. I'm heading bio to open bio to ventures. We invest in early stage biotech companies impacting planetary health and preferably also human health companies like we have X biotech. We focus a lot on the biotech to start with to make sure that that's a solid thing. And then we build all the rest next to it and a strong team only is easier. And Philippa. Hi, everyone. I'm Philippa, CDO of self of food and self of food is a cell by seafood company. We focus on molluscus crustaceans and fish. Thank you. And there's Harry. Harry, we'll go with you next. Hello. Thank you so much. I'm Harry with fear for X biotech. I'm a CCO the company and looking at industrial production, scale up and aspects of intellectual property. Thank you. Brilliant. Well, we'll get to David in a minute. I think he needs the presidential green button to accept. Amy, to get the ball rolling on today's discussion. I'd like to begin with a foundational question for you nutrition essential to everything we're talking about, whether it's about what we eat, how we produce it, or how we communicates its value. So from your point of view, how does plant based meat compared to conventional meat in terms of nutrition? What are its real strengths and where do the gaps still lie? Yeah, absolutely. And it's a really great question. I think actually something that a lot of people don't realize about plant use does have quite an interesting nutritional profile. So when we compare it to conventional meat, it generally has a high protein content. So in terms of the percentage of calories through protein is often kind of similar to conventional meat. A little bit lower in grams in protein for gram, just because it generally a bit lower calorie. But it's also a source of fiber, which we know make people don't eat enough of and it generally has a better fat profile. So it's generally low in saturated fat, whereas a lot of particularly processed meat is often high in saturated fat, which stops in something people should be trying to eat less of what possible. And I think in terms of the areas where I think we could have a little bit of improvement on average, I think the main thing that really strikes me is consistency. So I said generally there, but we do really have like really some products that are like really exceptional. Some products that are maybe a little bit left on the other side. And I think this is particularly true for fortification. So fortification with important new students, particularly people. It is really, it is very commonly an animal feed, and so it's very consistent in all animal products. And I think it would be very important for us to make sure that that she is also met in the kind of the plant based counterparts. Thank you for that David. Do you want to quickly introduce yourself? I'm going to ask you if you can somehow turn your mic down because you've got one of those professional ones that's a bit sensitive. I think we can hear your heartbeat. How's the volume now? I've got some work going on there. So great. Yeah. I'm David Lombard with Senos. We're formally precision fermentation. We provide intanks, sensors, data analytics for fermentation professionals. Our hope is to reduce in a wide array of industries from biofarm biofuels, alternative proteins, beverages, and our hope is to help professional, especially in food production. Operate more efficiently in scale. Great. It was great to have you with us. I'll come on to you in a second. Harry Amy's insights before they're on nutrition and product quality really highlight the importance of trust and transparency in this space. So how is PFX biotech contributing to new metrics and standards that can help establish clearer benchmarks for product quality and environmental impact? Do you see these standards influencing consumer confidence? Yeah. Thanks so much for the question, Nick. I think the aspect of creating new standards and the link to consumers, you know, can be traced back to two different things. You know, as PFX, we will be able to develop this in conjunction with other parties and other companies, which are in the food systems and we collaborate with to start bringing precision fermentation to be a new tool that is presented to consumers as an alternative to other processing methods. That are already established. Now, in terms of the benchmarks, there are environmental benchmarks and we, you know, as we start using precision fermentation, we will be looking and working with experts to develop life cycle analysis and all these types of, you know, the circularity models that actually account for all the cover footprint, not just for the process itself, but starting from the feedstocks across the, you know, the supply chain until you end in product. So this is one aspect of how we're pushing with others to bring the new new standards and new metrics for just particular process for precision fermentation. Now, the other aspect that is important and it has to do with metrics is the fact that the more we work on with the regulatory system across the globe, we start pushing for new benchmarks and new requirements for, you know, these new ingredients that then help us, you know, harmonize all those standards that then push, you know, for the harmonization of regulatory and helps bridge the gap and regulatory is across the world because some regulatory, you know, so regulatory offices in countries like Singapore and the US are more advanced in terms of accepting this, this new products coming from precision fermentation. And pushing the standards, pushing the new benchmarks for those products helps in bringing those products to market with support from customers. And the last point I was going to make is as we bring closer the safety and the appreciation of safety for precision fermentation as some manufacturing as a process, then that dispels the mess that, you know, these are products that are ultra-process, which is a fear that is currently in consumers. And then we will be talking a little bit more, you know, later on the conversation about that and how that impacts innovation as a whole. Yeah, we certainly will. Ali, now we've got that new fish and all framing. I've had to dig into the concepts at the heart of this session systems thinking. You spoke very persuasively that start there about how fragmented decision making, especially in product formulation can lead to missed opportunities. Can you expand at all on on what that systems approach means in the food context and how it differs from more traditional siloed models that we see today. Yeah, I think in food system, I think particularly also with regards to all these, you know, new technologies, system thinking is critical. It means considering the full ecosystem, the full picture. That's not just replacing a conventional ingredient with the more innovative ingredient, but really considering the ingredient replacement, processing technologies, the impact on the functionality, the supply chain. I mean, we're trying now to build right, I mean, whether that's precision or later cultured meat. I mean, I have to talk about supply chain, how that supply chain will be actually implemented in place at the largest scale and be efficient and cost cost efficient as well. The health impacts, it's a great opportunity for precision fermentation to bring new molecules with really very defined health and nutritional benefits sustainability, but all of these actually interconnect together and you can't just innovate in one of these sectors and forget the other. I think silos thinking for us and for me personally is actually a no go for precision fermentation, it has to be developed in that sort of system thinking platform and that's to enable smarter innovation quicker, better decision to help actually avoid, avoid unintended. And you could say consequences and ensure solutions deliver not just value across different multiple dimensions, but actually value that lasts and that disrupt the food system as a whole later. I'm building on that Harry, I'd love to hear your thoughts on enabling sustainable bioprocessing at scale, what are the biggest hurdles that your company faces in developing production methods that are only efficient, but truly scalable and biorementally sustainable. I mean, sustainable bioprocessing, the way we see it is, it has drivers that are related to the conjunction of outputs like minimizing the environment of food bring or one hand, then there's all their output about insurance scalability and the final output of economic visibility as Ali was saying. So those need to be actually been addressed at the same time to bring a particular product market, a particular process to be effective. The approach that we've taken in terms of sustainable bioprocessing is of course working with farmers to, in a sense, integrate the biology of what we need to be, you know, put it into place so they produce the proteins that we need to produce. But also the optimizing the feedstocks that we need to bring into the process and also optimizing the supply chain dynamics, where do we find those feedstocks, whilst the quality of the feedstock etc. So all these help in addressing the challenge of sustainable bioprocessing, but making it more effective by considering all the aspects as Ali was saying of a system that has different outputs at different points. Now the other thing that is more technical of course is introducing automation for a big part of, you know, the testing, the biology, etc. introducing artificial intelligence and new sense of technologies, either as part of the, as part of the fermentation tanks in a part of the production processes to, of course, improve efficiency. But also, as you start looking into that, then you, you know, come to this longer term, but not too long idea of using digital trends. The digital trends will be able to model your whole process from science to market and then that helps, you know, introducing and discovering new proteins and very quickly scaling up into into markets. Let's move from the big pictures to something quite specific, Deanna, you've made the case that alternatives, alternative proteins can and should go beyond simply replacing macro precision fermentation offers a pretty good opportunity to design for health benefits from the ground up. So what excites you most about engineering proteins with bioactive functionality, things like antioxidative or got modulating or immunosupported properties? Well, overall, the most exciting thing I think is that you can actually build your product, your ingredient, your molecule, either is protein or carbohydrate, whatever you are producing through this innovative technologies into health products into a well-being promoter. So you can actually tailor these ingredients to act not only as a nutritious food, but also beyond that that can help you overcome the certain aspects of nutrition. In terms of antioxidant, for example, you can push your proteins to have higher antioxidant capacities. You can make your proteins to be digestible, for example, and resistant, which makes them going directly to your colon being fermented and eat your gut microbiota and enhance the health of your gut microbiota. You can make those proteins more immunomodulators, providing a immune boosting, for example. So this extends to a span of applications. You can go as far as infant formula, to weld early, to human health, and use those proteins, actually, and when I'm in proteins, molecules in general that you are producing by precision fermentation or other that can actually tailor. So you can use this as a therapeutic food and not only just as a nutritious ingredient that you just respond. So you can go beyond that, beyond the nutrition, and feed more medically speaking, let's say, and target whoever needs specific and has specific needs in terms of advanced nutrition, for example. It's very exciting. David, of course, creating functional proteins is only part of the story, making them consistently and at scale requires a strong foundation of sensing and data infrastructure. So what are some of the biggest challenges in integrating accurate sensor data into fermentation workflows? And what does it take to overcome those challenges in order to improve product consistency? Yeah, well, there are several challenges. Sensitivity of small changes in fermentation, lack of real time visibility, and obviously fragment the data across systems, you know, fermentation is a dynamic process that happens as you go through your production process. And oftentimes sampling several times a day or having disparate data creates an issue that you may not see a problem as it develops something that you need to be able to make a just more change to. And then also with that data being silent and fragmented, you know, traditionally, there are larger systems and data that are out there that may not be talking to each other. They may be in something that you're not having real time visibility to. And so one of our hopes and one of the things we think that will be beneficial for the industry as a whole is creating a bridge that goes between all of the data points, not just the ones that, for example, does through our sensors, but all sensor data out there, being able to bring it into a single program. So to be able to overcome these challenges of being able to have visibility into the fermentation process and also overcome that hurdle of access to data and visibility data, we believe that we need to have more intense process around standardization of data and having single platforms that where professionals can get in and accurately in real time, see things as they happen during fermentation, be able to adjust to changes and problems as they develop and also be able to optimize, you know, as you're scaling up from your pilot into your larger program, being able to have the visibility to forecast into what it's going to be like from small to a bigger production is super key to being efficient and sustainable. So that visibility and being able to combine data, we think is a key point to the industry. So from your experience supporting early stage innovators, what are the key scientific inflection points that really resonate with investors, what makes them stop and say, yeah, this is fundable. Thanks for the question, the first thing, the more key inflection points, the better for sure, and I think a lot of stars will confirm that it's never enough when it comes to the key scientific points that you need to have. We feel it's very crucial is that there is indeed this combination of it's almost a Holy Grail light, you have solid science, you have economic viability and you need to show with customers that there's also traction that there's a potential to bring something to the market. A lot of startups, I think need to move beyond that very small scale where it's still easy to promise something you have something very small you put it in exile you do a multiplication of whatever and you get everything, what everything with people are looking for. That was the past now is different now you need to be at a certain scale, where this multiplication makes sense, so it means in practice that real data not only in the production or in your technology, but also in the whole process, should point into the right direction, I think this economic feasibility, the fact that you will be able to deliver a certain quantity based on your science still is very important. I think something that's very complimentary to this scientific inflection points specifically in the early phase is a team that can execute it's always this balance or you have great entrepreneurs and then you think okay they are a man it they will bring the science to a higher level or you have great science. We have very scientific people you need to find the balance of both and I think very early stage investors as a bit also see the investors still bet more on the jockey down the horse at this moment in time. Let's take a step into the world of cultivated seafood it's a rapidly developing field that touches everything from sustainability and food security to nutrition and cultural preference so Philippa how do you see cultivated seafood integrated into current food systems and what are the most important steps to ensure it delivers real value. Sure sure cultivated seafood has a potential to transform the current systems because it's attainable ethical and scalable so we have current issues with over fishing and habitat destruction of our species so we would cultivate it seafood we believe we can really make a tasty healthy product and and we have several advantages in our processes one being we can only do the edit we can only do edible parts. We can grow anywhere at any time we decouple our production from the supply chain and we don't rely on on animal seasonalities. Therefore we think that we have a really nice processes here that we can impact the food system and as it is as a new category complimentary to the current options there already exist and so also we think that because we can tailor what we add into the media of the cells we can also nutritionally improve the the the the product which for example omega three and also essential vitamins. And also regarding to your your second question part of the question which was about real value of cultivated meat we think that we need to make a product that's really delicious and it's right cost and that means really and decrease the cost of the media decrease the cost of the the scalability of of the bar reactors itself which has been a lot of companies have been really make good properties recently which is really really good to see also what we need is a good and strong regulatory framework and when is is a novel food cultivated need to see food so therefore we still need to see the dossiers coming through and the approval of the different countries and this will give the confidence to the consumers also and tick in terms of the safety of the product. And lastly like to to mention the trust and the confidence because is a new product there are people don't really know much about it so it's really important to keep building that transparency in the process keeping that trust and confidence and inform the consumers along the way so that they really see this as a good alternative. And you emphasize the importance of consumer trust in shaping products success to Harry from your perspective at pay effects biotech what strategies or innovations are critical to ensuring the alternative proteins are not only acceptable but also accessible and affordable for wide audience how do you balance inclusivity with innovation. Yeah so I mean again I think I have to to to mention that we we try to do this in partnership with others across the value chain of alternative proteins and and I'll tell you fools I mean one thing is is for sure consumers will try your product ones and if it doesn't work you will they will not try it again that's one thing that we have to do always keep in mind so all the issues of you know safety nutritional profile. And you know clarity about how you process and how you make your you know your ingredients and your product is it's paramount to bring it to the you know to the force of consumers are clear that these are not ultra processed you know ingredients that this is the not contain GMO which are you know a big big aspect of the fear that the consumers have about this alternative protein some people actually have been thinking about changing. You know the communication instead of calling alternative you have to call and sustainable proteins because alternative always bring an elements of fear which usually is is more powerful than the health focus messaging that we try to bring with this this new protein so so the elements that we are working on basically is focusing on on on collaboration with others to clearly communicate the value of position limitation. Bringing you know safety and nutritional profiles of the materials that we're producing are in terms of inclusivity is working with all the producing all the companies producing cheap alternatives to consider for instance in the future products that have a mixture of proteins. How do you think about those interdependencies and what are the risks of addressing them in isolation. Innovation we're really talking about a web of interconnected priorities nutrition sustainably sustainability sensory experience and as we've just mentioned consumer trust how do you think about those interdependencies and what are the risks of addressing them in isolation. Okay perfect so in terms of the system thinking so I think addressing all these different elements from nutrition to sustainability to sensory experience and I think as you mentioned and by how you as well consumer trust are very much interconnected to drive. And innovation piece forward and make it something established in the market if you ignore this interdependencies or ignore actually the system thinking to bring that innovation forward and actually you have a risk which is which could be of course unintended but the risk can be for example you've actually improved nutritional value or brought a very healthy protein as a novel ingredient but it has actually poor taste or it's actually very costly. At the end of the day that leads actually to issues in the market or the marketing campaign could be for example lower consumer acceptance could be lower adoption by the market or by players in the market due to higher cost etc etc. So I think actually bringing all of them and basically working innovating in all of these aspect is quite crucial actually to to drink an ingredient forward or a novel ingredient in this case forward. If you actually look even at the 1000 report specially reports concerning food systems thinking I mean foul really highlight that only holistic approaches can create lasting impact by balancing these factors and avoiding traits of that undermine innovation status and I just have to actually test again the word lasting impact so I think that's really important to want to build something that's normal affordable. That's healthy tasty as well but also has a lasting impact that's crucial to advance the food system. And Philip are on that topic of trust how important is it to gather an act on consumer data early in the development process especially for something as novel as cultivated seafood can can that input actually shape the trajectory of product success. Absolutely we need to understand consumer preferences this is fundamental for us developing our products engaging early with consumers into development product listen to them see what they're the expectations what they expecting for the product for the product and of course in our case informing them how is it made and that's really helpful for us. So for example initiatives like like fists which they have going to do some consumer consumer panels to really test in terms of cultivated meat in seafood that for us would be super informative and important of course also GFI and the service that they do that they have done with cultivated meat acceptance specifically also in Europe that's really helpful and and give us some directions of which way we should go we need more but this is really really helpful. And these early engagements are really really important because with them we can we find really find our process and help us to kind of get it right for the first time and and get in the market quicker with the right product that consumers would wanting to buy it and to eat it of course. Let's return to application now designing a protein in the lab is one thing but ensuring it behaves predictably in real world food products that's an entirely different kettle of fish DNA what kind of functionality do you look for when developing proteins for use in different product formats and then how do you validate that performance. Good question and and actually is the point of the to the what we do so pfx doesn't do the final product we don't produce the final product and we produce the ingredient so as Harry said partnerships here are very important because we need to work with our partners our potential customers to understand what they need for their own customers as well. So we have to look to the key functionalities according to the application that our proteins are aiming to for example if we are looking for incorporating our proteins into a beverage then solubility would be a key points to look at if we are looking are yogurt or desserts jelly is another key functionality. And so on if the product will undergo a thermal processing then thermal stability will be also an issue to look at so all this what we call techno functionalities are key to understand the product the final product itself and to make sure that the product will not be altered during processing and without the processing until the end product. So we look and of course we need to test we need to understand this functionality and at the end we need to prototype this formulation so work with our client or customer to understand what are the products that they are going to sell to put in the market and understand what the key functionality that they want to see in that product then of course we need to formulate those proteins accordingly. Test in the food matrix that are going to be available to the to the consumer to see at the end if all these functionalities are consistent to out the processing. David we're going to stay with production for a moment beyond consistent these consistency there's also a sustainability imperative in what ways are analytics platforms helping manufacturers reduce waste in fermentation processes without compromising on quality. So it's a good segue from what Diana just said the lab is a controlled space you know when you're in the bench and a pilot program it's very predictable you know as I think I mentioned earlier but production environments themselves as you scale up moving from the pilot to the scale that's a different story and so analytics helps. Yet someone from the pilot to scale predictably a lot of what we're doing is providing not just insight predictability to customers by providing them with data so the first point where sustainability comes in is as you move to scale and when you get into this very dynamic environment that's when problems can emerge. And things can go for example you know if you have the correct data you know we've built the largest part of fermentation database in the world we've done over 30,000 fermentations from our beverage industry that we're bringing into other markets we can predict for a customer what is going to happen based upon not only their own historical data but also benchmark them against other people in their category. It can help you go from pilot to scale efficiently that's that's key but from a sustainability standpoint if you're changing inputs if you need to optimize inputs especially as you're moving to scale having the correct data and the historical information the analytics to tell you predictably what will happen on the outcome that's key and that's where data and if applied correctly can help someone move up a program move from scale into scalability. The other thing is about avoiding product loss you know we talk to our customers a lot about you know things are moving it's dynamic fermentation isn't something that happens when you sample in the morning your sample in the afternoon or sample in the evening fermentation happens continuously throughout the production process so it's key to have the data that tells you something's happening so you don't avoid losing obviously from a sustainability perspective if you have to lose a batch depending on the production process that can go from small to large. That can have a significant impact so having that data and that visibility so you can make adjustments and scale up your production is very very key to sustainability and in the beverage space and in the beer space we've estimated we've saved millions of gallons of water just by being able to optimize both the input and the process into production. So data plays a key part in terms of visibility and control for our customers in the entire industry. And we're going to come back to investment biotech it's a long game let's face it it's often expensive highly regulated and requires patience so how do you convince investors that this journey is not only worthwhile but offers a robust return on investment. Yeah robust return on investment is always a big question mark of course but indeed a long timelines meet lot of money long roads to really get the return on investment and it's not the most sexy value proposition to bring to an investor who wants to also report to his or her LPs to a Thursday return so we and I think there's general in biotech already work a lot with investors who focus more on this law. We've lost, we lost, Anika there. Anika, are you there? Can you hear me again? Yeah we can we lost you first. Where did you lost me in the middle of the world? Yeah probably. Yeah well okay when it comes to investment so selecting some investors who have a longer term horizon I think that's the difficult key but when it comes to how to convince time. Yes it's a long game but the payoff can be enormous as with a lot of companies with biotech of course the fact that you now have this climate urgency consumer demand I think is definitely one of the topics that we're discussing today also all the advances in in sin bio and in biotech by itself. It shows that there is a big opportunity and is better for the consumer better for the planet resonates luckily still with a lot of investors so yes capital intensive yes regulation can be very painful slow but the upside is that the market can be big. You have this competitive advantage because very often biotech companies have a technology platform with a lot of IP where they focus on one ingredient and can do much more. And the impact that matters luckily still resonates with a lot of investors. Now Amy you pleased us at the start about UPF's there's been a lot of media retention recently around ultra process foods and plant based meat often gets caught in that narrative so what does the research actually show and why might the concerns around ultra process foods not directly apply to this category. Yes I think this is a great question also off the bat I want to say this is an incredibly complicated a nuanced topic and so there there is a lot to unpack and I think that at least a lot of people kind of talking past each other and I think it's important to kind of to look at the whole argument look at the evidence where we have evidence where we need more evidence I think that's kind of the crux of where this comes down to so. So with regard to plant based meat I think this broadly relates to two key factors the first of which being plant based me has a very different nutritional profile to most of the foods in the ultra process category. And it also usually replaces things like processed meat which we know independent of processing that are often kind of associated with increased health risks when they're in excess. So to kind of go back to that point of what is the research so it's important to remember that the Nova system which is how you be asked to define. It's fundamentally is an epidemiological framework and what that means is it's it's a study of how diseases kind of occur over time so. And I call this much arrow who developed the framework he is an epidemiologist of obesity and and therefore what the research looks at the looks at the population level and they take food diaries and they follow people over long periods of time. And they compare the outcomes of the people who eat the least ultra process food is a proportion of their. With those who have like the highest proportion of their of their daily calories coming from ultra process food and that has so obviously like if we bear in mind that a lot of the ultra process foods category like the most commonly eaten ones are things like cakes pastries fizzy drinks hot dogs process meat is kind of obvious is kind of is quite striking when you look at that category they're like if that's most of the category that there's going to be some of that. Negative health impacts that we see. At least that is caused by the nutritional factors and the research that we still need to do bulldoze is going to be focusing on unpacking like how much of this is nutrition or how much of this is processing like which elements of processing. Because obviously if you boil an egg it can increase how digestible and available the nutrients in art if you boil vegetables it can reach the vitamins out of it so like a given processing step can have like a different impact on the nutritional quality of a food. Depending on what the food is and so I think there's just a whole of complexity that needs to be unpacked in order to kind of understand this a bit more but when we specifically look at that. This sort of epidemiological population research on UPF and I think we can argue quite compellingly that well so first because it's such a long period of time these studies look at the original food diaries that they're based on are often kind of over 10 years old. And plant-based meat most plant-based meat wasn't really widely available at that point in time and we can see when we look at the breakdowns of the different foods in those studies that like less than half a percent of the calories are coming from plant-based meat and we can see like much higher percentages like over 10 percent. I'm coming from those those other things I mentioned like cakes pastries all of that kind of things so obviously there's the cakes and the pastries that we are expecting are probably behind most of the associations. And also we see that when we look at studies that look specifically in plant-based meat we find so there was a systematic review at the end of last year of randomized control trials which found most notably the LDL which is bad cholesterol reduction. We've seen really consistently across trials and likewise weight loss in people with overweight was also like quite consistently seeing a lot of trials and those match up with the nutrient profile. So that's kind of what we would expect when we replace a food that's generally kind of higher in calories saturated fat low in fiber with a food that is low in saturated fat and high in fiber. I think in the instance of plant-based meat that to me suggests that that nutritional profile is going to be a more important factor. But obviously we do need more research and I think yeah it's a very as I say a very complex area to summarize quickly but I think yeah definitely worth worth doing and worth looking into. Is it's worthy of its own dedicated webinar I think Deanna a quick follow up from a product design angle how do you approach different food matrices when applying functional proteins are there lots of tools and processes that help anticipate all those proteins will behave. Well that goes actually to the question that David answer and you you will use data for it as well so to start with you need to understand the proteins the intrinsic properties of the proteins that you are producing. As well as you understand the product that you are going to produce at the end with those ingredients with those proteins so this is fundamental to understand what are you going to do. Of course then after caratizing the key functionality that you are looking for either is solubility either is emulsification either is thermal stability whatever it is in model systems you need to understand how they are going to behave in model systems of course. And this is the first stage you can always go to a second stage after that in silico for example and throughput on results in data that will kind of anticipate the performance of your ingredient when incorporated in the final product and that's that was David. We are referring to it's important because we are in a digital area i.e. so we can use those the predictable tools to reduce the trial and errors and reduce costs and time that takes us to do systematically trials and understanding how our proteins will function within a food matrix so you can reduce that using digital tools and predict the behaviors and performance. And at the end as Felipe was saying the consumer is the one that is going to actually say the final words so doing a final trial sensory panels having feedback from those consumers that actually will consume the product that your protein is incorporated to it's it's important so you need to incorporate those proteins that you are producing in real food metrics. And give them to the consumer in general for final approval let's say so this will enable kind of targets and faster and reliable product development if you combine all these tools together. So Felipe something that gets sometimes overlooked in all protein innovation is the human factor collaboration and why do you see cross functional teamwork as such a critical part of building better food systems, particularly in cultivated proteins. Now I agree that the human factor and the collaboration side is super important I think unfortunately in our areas mostly when such a do you feel company relies a lot on IP on the technology and the quiet area of talking to each other not to kind of say too much or and this is a bit of a shame because we can and we should keep the relationship and and work together. Even protecting those those areas that you don't want to disclose because that's your advantage and that's what's make also a company successful. So however yes we need to protect these there's so many other areas that we can work together to build the market to increase this consumer accept exception adoption. And also our early was saying is that we our areas spend a lot of different areas right so we need regulatory compliance we need police makers we need engineers scale up people we need academics we need consumers we need to teach and educate. And each of these different areas have such an important piece to play in in our fields and that is really crucial to to recognize that we need each other work together. And to even celebrate each other success I think something that's you know it's sometimes we don't do enough to each other mostly in such young fields as ours is even early younger cultivated meat but really you know cheer each other is something that is is really important and will will be seen as confidence and trust and that will contribute to the to the consumers. Let's stick with that female collaboration how could different stakeholders the startups the academia as Phillipa mentioned corporates how can they build shared frameworks and data models to support more coherent decision making across the value chain. Yes I think you're right question that's something I believe in from the number one when we started pfx biotech you can't succeed as a startup alone you know start up you know you bring the energy to passion the development the agility in innovation decision making but to succeed you need to succeed in in that you know very diverse ecosystem so collaboration corporate startup corporate startup universities consumer you know associations. Different players in the market different market verticals I think all of them they need to investors of course you know you need all to capital institutional money et cetera et cetera so I think the recipe for success is collaboration among all the key players in any given industry especially in today's world. Today's world we're actually an innovation for example in Europe impacts what happened in the US vice versa a share you know especially today's world it's really innovation and collaboration that's the key for success that's that's my take you know from the number one and I think we've filled with build our self as as an open innovation start up trying of course to harvest as much as possible from different parties bring also benefits to different parties as well in that collaboration. At the end of the day that collaboration needs always to be a win-win for all parties involved. Just going to take a couple of questions from the audience here I think this one's probably for Annick it's from Matilda do Chi how do you approach regulatory challenges when investing in precede versus in series A or B. Thanks for the question Matilda and what the and that bit between precede and series A and B you still have the seat of course in our case the team and the fact that they are open to support and willingness to dig into regulatory without being fully drowned by it is almost a key thing that we take into account in a precede in the seat however we feel that investors already would like to see that the team themselves have an idea of the challenges I have and that they know these are the different regulatory hurdles I can take depending on how the future looks like whether it's my product that moves in a certain direction or an ingredient I can move from A to B. You don't need to have everything figured out but the strategy around how it will be that that is what going to be and then of course the series A the series B they use their money to really go into a certain path and make sure that you take the box and can bring something to market. And this is probably a quick one for Ali or Harry and it's from Camilla Foneguera if I pronounce the right as you look at sustainable protein alternatives through the lens of systems innovation how do you see the role of insect protein evolving alongside fermentation based solutions particularly in terms of scalability consumer acceptance and integration into existing food systems we don't normally touch on insects but I'll ask you. No we haven't touched on insect proteins but I think I think it's a great question actually I'm trying to actually think the question and say for example yeah if you look at it from a sort of system innovation lens I think both of them right they say very complimentary roles precision fermentation based solution and insect protein solutions I think insects offer a lot on on on actually efficient upcycling of organic waste into high protein biomass so if you think if you think about it from a sustainability and the circularity perspective I think it's a great solution especially for possibly for feed application I think for feed application probably more than food or maybe other niche food application I think I will stress really on the circularity aspect of insect proteins and applications in feed. White percent fermentation you know in terms of purity scalability I think it's positioned quite well for functional food ingredients. I'm not again I don't have any data in front of me but the perception is that potentially insect proteins may face actually greater consumer resistance but they excel in circularity. One fermentation on the other hand will be actually integrated more seamlessly into ingredient systems that's my take I don't know how to talk about other foods. I mean the only only photo art is that yes and you know we should learn the lessons from insect proteins and how they found found their niche after trying to communicate different things and then being part now of the ecosystem of proteins and the diversification of protein sources. I mean one aspect that was key for the insect protein is finding the right standards and analytical standards so there are no issues of immunogenicity or immune resistance and all contaminations that might come from these type of sources. But yes I think it's an important one to take into account as an example of how these alternatives protein have found acceptance in a specific niche. We've got about five minutes left so aiming returning to innovation where do you see the greatest opportunity for research and plant based processing and formulation are there specific technical gaps that you feel the field is ready to tackle. Yes he was a really good question and I think so I always look at this I've always I've either before I was involved in any of the alternative protein things before I went to GFI I've always really liked plant based because I do a lot of sport and I find it very useful in terms of like it's protein to calorie ratio and it's also like really quite convenient and I think a lot of the time it has a really unique nutritional profile and I think a lot of the time you don't really think about like where could we apply that nutritional profile. And I think there are a few areas where I think that's particularly noticeable we know that there's a few so like athletes is one of them but also like older people often have high protein high protein needs I think people if you're if you're trying to kind of manage a weight having high protein also high fiber which is a great combo and allows me. Combined having that can right help maintain muscle mass while losing fat and so I think exploring those like just just looking at the nutrient profile and the kind of kind of exploring like where where is that most useful I think could be a really useful. And I also think in terms of like actually research obviously validating that and seeing if it actually works but also I think this by availability pieces a really important part of of the processing so yeah with with both micronutrients and also it also protein like processing approaches and fermentation can be really useful in improving how digestible a lot of the things inside inside the food jar so I think that's actually quite another useful lens and one that it will be very important to explore a bit more. Now I need all of you to prepare yourself for a quick fire closing question but Ali just around out the session let's look forward and what future facing trends things like circularity decentralized production new health claims are you keeping a close eye on as the next wave of nutritional innovation. Oh difference I think we really closely watching different trends decentralized production circularity definitely and also evolving health claims potentially this is of course sort of more medium long term but I think those are really important trends to watch especially in an efficient you know within nutrition innovation so circularity definitely drives the resource efficiency of been talking about that I think in the beginning with just mentioned. A question about insect protein as well so resource efficiency decentralized the models of production and business models I think enables producing different food ingredients would say regardless probably how tense for example geopolitical situations are and that of course I think in some some regions of the world that definitely contributes to food security beyond the beyond just nutrition innovation it contributes to food security. Which means of course also more resilient food system in many parts of the world I think new healthy claims or more or less personal lives in fish and I think it's really growing the trend microbiome support and you know microbiome support beyond just beyond just probiotic postbiotic prebiotic okay what's the link between microbiome and other health benefits either any mechanistic mechanism of action. That we can learn from and help to design a little new solutions new food ingredients or new solutions definitely I think together they're all promised more sustainable and accessible and impact with food solution. I think is with all of these I think friends many the bit of time definitely to keep them are ensuring and impacting impacting the food system more than they do today so for me it's just really matter of time before we see the impact and the benefits unfold completely. Well that we need to wrap up before someone pulls the plug on us so here's a quick fire question I'm going to go around as I say you're on my screen what's one change big or small that you believe will have the biggest impact on the future of nutrition so Deanna I'm going to start with you. Just a few sentences it would be that option of precision fermentation to produce custom design molecules with health benefits definitely this will be a change for nutrition. I think we'll be consumer perception and understanding that they can have better nutrition without their traditional products. Amy. I think I'm really excited about just unlocking fungi and exploring and learning more about fungi and have a how their applications are food if they're really cool. Got a huge feature on that in the next issue and it. Data and AI I think building upon all the data that you already have and how it can make things go faster much more tailored that I think is in biotech the whole drill. Harry. I think it's unlocking the power of biology into engineering that's that's the future engineering biology thank you. David. If predictable all comes with a goal to be better and more efficient it's the the moment that we have full and open transparent access and visibility into data could be biased on this but I think that if we can treat data inside fermentation like other areas of the world has what's happening right now I think that a lot unlock entirely new ecosystem for nutrition. And we started with Alice we're going to finish with you. Well, I think besides what have been said, I think policymakers are working in a more agile frame or more or less close to the face of startups and innovation innovation. These days cannot actually stay innovation for like a decade or more, I think we're really in a fast-paced environment so policymakers shout you. Okay, well that's all we have time for today. We hope you've enjoyed today's session. We'd like to thank all of our speakers, that's Amy, Deanna, Annick, Philippa, Harry, David, and especially Ali for the presentation at the starts, especially mentioned Jared who could not be with us today we're thinking of you buddy. We would like to thank PFX biotech for being our sponsor today and helping us put together another fantastic panel of experts. You can join us next month on the 25th June for yeast unleashed. The future alternative proteins starts in the ferment and that's in partnership with Angel yeast. If I didn't get a chance to ask your question today, I'm sure our speakers won't mind you reaching out to them on LinkedIn so you can get an answer from them direct. And finally, don't forget that the Q-1 2025 edition of our magazine Protein Production Technology International, it's the hub of everything we do here is out now, but the Q-2 2025 edition is nearing completion and will be published in about a week's time. So thank you all for joining us. We'll see you next month. Until then, bye bye. Thank you for listening to the Protein Production Technology International podcast. We hope you gained valuable insights and knowledge about the innovative technologies and practices transforming how we produce Protein. Don't forget to subscribe to PPTI Magazine and follow us on social media to stay up to date with the latest news and updates. Stay tuned for more exciting episodes.