French Animal-Free Casein Maker Strikes Deal with Ajinomoto to Scale Up Manufacturing

French precision fermentation innovator Standing Ovation has partnered with Ajinomoto Foods Europe to produce its animal-free casein protein at industrial scale.

As it gears up to begin sales of its cow-free dairy protein, Paris-based Standing Ovation is leveraging the tech expertise and capabilities of Ajinomoto’s industrial-scale plant in northern France.

The precision fermentation startup has struck a long-term deal with Ajinomoto Foods Europe – the regional arm of the Japanese conglomerate – to produce animal-free milk protein in Nesle.

According to Standing Ovation, the facility is located close to its main customers, which it described as “world leaders in the dairy industry”. It also uses local raw materials and renewable energy sources.

It comes months after the company raised €3.75M in a Series A extension round to get its Advanced Casein product to the US market later this year.

“Our partnership with Ajinomoto Foods Europe originated from a shared vision to driving economic growth with sustainability and social impact in both of our activity,” Standing Ovation CEO Yvan Chardonnens, who took over from co-founder Romain Chayot in September, told Green Queen.

“We recognised a unique opportunity for the mutual alignment of needs to achieve shared goals and innovate in precision fermentation,” he added. “As of now, our collaboration is focused on long-term and spans several years.”

Recombinant casein preserves dairy’s sensory properties

Precision fermentation combines the process of traditional fermentation with the latest advances in biotechnology to efficiently produce a compound of interest, such as a protein, flavour molecule, vitamin, pigment, or fat.

Standing Ovation makes use of the technology to produce what it describes as bioidentical casein, which makes up 80% of the protein content found in milk. It is responsible for emulsification, stabilisation and gelation, among other features, giving cheese its melty and stretchy properties, and ice cream its creamy texture.

The startup says its tech and manufacturing processes are protected by seven patent families and have allowed it to establish strategic partnerships with prominent dairy players, including French dairy giant Bel Group.

“We are developing several ranges of sustainable alternative proteins for industrial leaders,” Chardonnens said. “Our solutions cover a wide range of applications: dairy products (cheeses, yoghurts, ice cream) with Advanced Casein, and other food solutions currently in development.”

Standing Ovation’s Advanced Casein powder is said to preserve dairy’s functional and sensory properties. It’s also much better for the environment than the cow-derived version. An independent life-cycle assessment has found that its precision-fermented casein generates 94% fewer greenhouse gas emissions, and enables the industry to make much better use of water and land.

Standing Ovation targeting US launch this year

With bioreactors exceeding 100 cubic metres in scale and comprehensive downstream processing capacities, Ajinomoto Foods Europe has established itself as a contract manufacturing partner for precision fermentation, with applications scanning food, personal care, crop protection, biomaterials, and nutraceuticals.

“With this partnership, we will scale our capacity significantly,” said Chardonnens. “We are expected to triple our production capacity with the expansion of our partnerships, and scale our production to several hundred tonnes.” He hinted that the collaboration has “potential to lead to co-development opportunities” between the two entities.

So far, only New Culture and Fermify have been cleared to sell animal-free casein in the US, both obtaining self-determined GRAS (Generally Recognized as Safe) status last year.

“Our regulatory plans focus on ensuring compliance across all relevant markets. We are actively working to meet self-GRAS approval [in the US] this year, FDA approval in 2026, and [EU] novel foods authorisation in 2027,” revealed Chardonnens.

Ajinomoto Foods Europe CEO Hiroshi Kaneko said the move reflected the companies’ “shared commitment to creating economic, sustainable, and social impact”. “With food innovation at the heart of Ajinomoto Group’s legacy, we are eager to leverage our expertise in precision fermentation to support their large-scale manufacturing efforts,” he added.

Its move to team up with Standing Ovation comes as more and more conglomerates are relying on startups to make synthetic biology plays. In October, it formed a similar partnership with German biotech startup AmSilk to produce recombinant spider silk proteins, and its parent company co-launched a range of products with Solar Foods’s gas-based Solein protein a few months prior too.

Fellow Japanese food giant Meiji joined forces with cell-based cocoa maker California Cultured to distribute chocolate products using the latter’s ingredient.