Plenary - Startup Collaboration & Pitch Excellence Award

• Startup Pitches - Intro - Heidi Høy, Food & Bio Cluster Denmark & Kevin Camphuis, Shakeup Factory
• Shorter Recipes. No Additives. Better Texture - Erik d'Achuamp, FERM FOOD

FERM FOOD develops fermented functional ingredients that enable food producers to create cleaner labels, simplify formulations, and reduce the use of additives and preservatives. Our solutions support improved stability, cohesion, and mouthfeel across a range of applications. We will present FERM FOOD Binder for plant-based and hybrid products, alongside FERM FOOD Bread Binder, developed specifically for gluten-free applications.

• Multifunctional Ingredients - Do More with Less - Frederik Jensen, SUMM Ingredients

SUMM Ingredients develops next-generation multifunctional food ingredients through proprietary cross-fermentation technology. Our flagship ingredient, FermiPro®, replaces multiple additives — delivering taste, texture, and nutrition in a single clean-label input, cutting formulation complexity and cost for food manufacturers.

• The Future of Plant Protein is Simple, Local and Delicious Dr. Elli Laukkala, Happy Plant Protein

Happy Plant Protein is a food technology spin-off from VTT, transforming how plant-based proteins are produced.

Their patented technology enables cost-effective, sustainable production of high-quality plant protein ingredients using existing dry extrusion lines—without major investments. It also unlocks value from local crops and side streams, turning them into premium ingredients.

Happy Plant Proteins offers their solution through flexible licensing, helping partners scale production and innovate faster in the growing plant-based market.

• Egg Yolk Replacements for Sauces and Dressings from Microalgae - Ewoud de Voogd, AlgMighty

AlgMighty makes natural drop-in replacements for emulsifiers and binders out of microalgae. So producers of sauces, dressing and soups can replace egg yolk, lecithin and methylcellulose. And make their product at the same time clean label and more healthy with a lower footprint. With the same cost-in-use. AlgMighty harvests the primal power of microalgae and just cracks it. A real solution to feed the world in 2050. And an answer to the current volatility of our egg chains.

• Converting Carbon Dioxide into Food and Other Ingredients

 Dr. Kaly Chatakondu, Global Commercial Director - Arborea

• Making Commerical Fermentation Profitable - Troels Prahl, Swan Neck Bio

Swan Neck Bio offers a ready-to-use, quality-certified inoculum (DIRINOC™) that enables simpler and more reliable biomanufacturing. Today, promising food and biotech innovations stall at scale—held back by slow testing cycles, high capital requirements, and operational risk. Swan Neck Bio aims to challenge the status quo and solve this. We draw on proven practices from the dairy and alcohol industries.

• Differential Bio
• We Solved the Taste Problem in Plant Derived Protein

Daria Reisch, CEO & Co-Founder - SentiaNova

SentiaNova is rewriting what pulse protein can taste like. Our proprietary pre-processing technology removes off-flavours from pulse proteins such as pea, chickpea, and faba bean at the source. The result is white, neutral-tasting, clean-label ingredients that finally let plant protein perform across categories, from RTDs to dairy alternatives to bakery. We operate an asset-light model, face no novel food regulatory hurdles, and partner with ingredient producers to scale volumes fast, helping food manufacturers move beyond the taste ceiling that has held the category back.

Off-flavours removed. Not masked.

• Pioneering Clean-Label Taste Enhancer Technology for the Hybrid Food Revolution

 Dr. Charlotte Vinther Schmidt, CEO & Co-Founder -  Feast Ingredients

Explore how next-generation clean-label taste enhancer technology is helping drive the hybrid food revolution, delivering improved flavour experiences without compromising on ingredient simplicity or consumer trust.

• Taste through Fermentation for Healthy, Sustainable, Accessible Food

Marie-Astrid Gouin, Head of Sales & Marketing - Fungu'It

Fungu’it develops natural aromatic and functional ingredients from agricultural side streams for next generation food applications. We transform low value residues—such as cereal brans, seed press cakes, and fruit fibers—into clean label ingredients that deliver rich umami, roasted, fishy, and cocoa like taste profiles, along with functional benefits like improved water retention, off note masking, and natural coloration. Using solid state fermentation, we unlock value from these side streams in a robust and scalable way, working across a wide range of raw materials while keeping the process efficient and low CAPEX. By pairing the right fungal strains with specific substrates, we design tailored ingredient profiles that form a versatile toolbox for food manufacturers. We don’t produce finished food products; instead, we create functional building blocks that help manufacturers replace synthetic additives, enhance and refine taste, and integrate upcycled ingredients into their supply chains. Our ingredients are used across plant based meat, hybrid products, sauces, savory applications, and cocoa based foods, where they deliver better flavor, improved performance, cost efficiency, and a stronger sustainability story.

• Real-Time Process Visibility with a Multi-Parameter Sensor

InSpek builds a multi-parameter sensor to measure everything that’s happening inside d bioprocesses. Its miniaturized, chip-based probe sits directly inside the bioreactor and measures in real time the chemistry like substrates, metabolites, and product titer, but also physical parameters like pH, dissolved oxygen, temperature, and biomass -- all on a single low-cost device. By making continuous monitoring affordable and accessible at every scale, from screening to production, InSpek helps precision fermentation and alt-protein companies close the lab-to-tank gap, increase yields, and reach commercial scale faster. InSpek is already working with leading bioprocess players to bring smart, data-driven fermentation to industry.

Jérôme Michon, CEO & Co-founder, InSpek