GEA to equip BFF’s food-grade line for precision and biomass fermentation
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GEA has been selected to deliver and commission an open-access, food-grade pilot line for BFF on the NIZO campus in Ede, Netherlands. The facility gives startups and ingredient biotech a place to test, validate and scale precision- and biomass-fermentation – turning lab success into application-ready samples. Installation is planned for 2026; pilot operations from Spring 2027 (tbc). With one-site flow from fermentation to DSP, the project addresses Europe’s “missing middle” and de-risks the step toward first commercial orders.
Scaling New Food in Europe
GEA to equip BFF’s food-grade line for precision and biomass fermentation
- Contract: GEA will deliver and commission a precision-fermentation upscaling line for BFF (NIZO Food Innovation Campus in Ede, Netherlands).
- Timing: Installation in 2026; pilot operations from 2027
- Impact: Provides the missing middle where innovators validate under food-grade conditions and move faster toward first commercial orders
Düsseldorf (Germany), January 13, 2026 – GEA has been selected to deliver and commission a precision and biomass fermentation upscaling line for Biotechnology Fermentation Factory (BFF), an open-access site on the NIZO Food Innovation Campus in Ede, Netherlands. The facility gives food and ingredient companies a food-grade infrastructure to test, validate and scale products such as animal-free dairy proteins, egg-white proteins, specialty enzymes, flavors and fragrances, and other functional biomolecules. Installation is scheduled for 2026, with pilot operations targeted from 2027.
Frederieke Reiners, Vice President New Food, GEA: “Open-access capacity is the critical development link many innovators have been missing. By delivering BFF’s line, we help teams validate their processes faster under food-grade conditions – and as the logical next step from our GEA New Food Application & Technology Center (proof-of-concept) this pilot environment enables application-ready material and decision-grade data sets that de-risk the move toward commercial manufacturing. It also advances Mission 30, where biotechnology meets scalable industrial production.”
Marcel Oogink, Managing Director, Biotechnology Fermentation Factory (BFF Ede), said:
“Our aim is straightforward: to give the industry dependable open-access capacity to validate processes under realistic, food-grade and scalable conditions. With GEA supplying this line, companies will gain the technical reliability and speed they need to move confidently from lab development toward industrial readiness.”
Closing the missing link with an open-access model
Many precision and biomass fermentation projects stall between lab proof-of-concept and the first commercial investment decision. BFF’s model addresses this gap with a single, coherent validation environment that de-risks tech transfer, accelerates time-to-validation and supports Europe’s move toward biotechnology-enabled food production.
BFF operates as an open-access facility, offering a bookable fermentation upscaling capacity, process expertise and quality procedures to run pilot campaigns and generate decision-grade data without the need to build a facility of its own. Operating under food-grade standards, BFF produces trial volumes suitable for sensory evaluation and application testing, giving product teams material they can use in subsequent end-product development.
Capacity and integrated workflow that support credible decisions
Anchored by both a 1,000 liter and a 10,000-liter main fermenter, GEA is delivering an integrated upstream-to-downstream line for food-grade operations – from media preparation and controlled fermentation to cell harvest and a filtration train for recovery and polishing – with commissioning and validation support to produce decision-grade data sets while keeping organisms, recipes and commercial figures confidential.
This setup complements BFF’s existing pre-pilot assets and its biomass fermentation lines and directly connects to the downstream processing (DSP) pilot plant at NIZO on the same campus. Teams can run fermentation, primary recovery and professional-scale concentration and purification in one place. Together, this creates one of Europe’s most complete mid-scale, food-grade validation environments for precision and biomass fermentation.
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About GEA
GEA is one of the world’s largest suppliers of systems and components to the food, beverage and pharmaceutical industries. The international technology group, founded in 1881, focuses on machinery and plants, as well as advanced process technology, components and comprehensive services. For instance, every second pharma separator for essential healthcare products such as vaccines or novel biopharmaceuticals is produced by GEA. In food, every fourth package of pasta or every third chicken nugget are processed with GEA technology. With more than 18,000 employees, the group generated revenues of about EUR 5.5 billion in more than 150 countries in the 2024 fiscal year. GEA plants, processes, components and services enhance the efficiency and sustainability of customers’ production. They contribute significantly to the reduction of CO2 emissions, plastic usage and food waste. In doing so, GEA makes a key contribution toward a sustainable future, in line with the company’s purpose: ”Engineering for a better world.”GEA is listed on the DAX, the STOXX® Europe 600 Index and is also a constituent of the leading sustainability indices DAX 50 ESG, MSCI Global Sustainability and Dow Jones Best-in-Class World.
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