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Sustainable, biobased creatine produced via precision fermentation to fortify foods and beverages with proven health benefits.
About
The global shift from animal-based to plant-based diets has created un-addressed nutrient deficiencies. Plant-based diets often lack essential nutrients found in animal products. One critical nutrient is creatine, which is important for energy metabolism, muscle health, and brain function. About half of our daily creatine needs must come from food, and insufficient intake negatively affects physical performance, cognition, growth and development.
Currently, creatine on the market is produced through chemical synthesis from fossil-based resources like coal, making it an unsustainable process. Moreover, the impurities derived from this process can have negative health risks and unpleasant taste, limiting its potential for food applications.
Our solution is precision fermentation: we engineered the creatine pathway into a well-characterized bacterial workhorse, enabling synthesis from renewable feedstocks such as agricultural side streams. This method eliminates harmful by-products and provides a sustainable source of creatine to strengthen the nutritional profile of functional foods and beverages. We are now optimizing and scaling the biomanufacturing process to launch the first biologically produced creatine, bringing sustainable performance and wellness to human nutrition.
Key Benefits
- Proven Nutritional Value
Creatine is a well-recognized nutrient with well-established effects for boosting physical performance, endurance, and muscle health, as well as emerging benefits for memory, attention, and mood.
- Food Industry Ready
Creatine is available widely as a dietary supplement. It is already incorporated into certain foods on the market, showing its compatibility with formulation, stability, and other technical requirements.
- Natural & Biobased Advantage
Unlike fossil-based synthetic creatine, our ingredient is produced via precision fermentation. This allows it to be labelled as natural and biobased, aligning with consumer demand for clean, sustainable, and health-conscious ingredients.
- Brand Value & Competitive Edge
Incorporating our sustainable creatine enables food and beverage companies to enhance product nutrition, appeal to health-conscious consumers, and reinforce their sustainability commitments, creating a clear point of differentiation in the fast-growing functional food and beverages market.
Applications
Our primary target market is the functional food and beverage sector, where the demand for sustainable, health-promoting ingredients is expanding rapidly.
Consumers demand food and drinks with vitamins, minerals, probiotics, among others. Therefore, companies like Nestlé, Danone, and PepsiCo are innovating around health, immunity, gut health, protein, low sugar, etc [1].
The global market for functional food and beverages was estimated around USD 178 billion in 2019 and is forecast to reach USD 267 billion by 2027 [2]. While our initial estimates consider capturing only a fraction of this, the substantial market size offers significant commercialization potential.
Creatine is already one of the most popular sports supplements, making sports nutrition a proven entry channel for creatine fortified drinks. At the same time, growing awareness of creatine’s importance for both physical and cognitive welfare positions it as an ingredient boosting health benefits [3]. With consumers increasing skepticism of synthetic additives, the novelty of our biobased creatine delivers a clear and differentiated value proposition.
In addition, creatine fortification addresses nutritional deficiency of plant-based diets. This strategy mirrors the competitive action of major players in the precision fermentation and functional ingredient space: DSM-Firmenich has a product portfolio including vitamin B group and omega-3, all produced from precision fermentation. Lesaffre, known for its yeast expertise, has also entered the arena with vitamin K and other fortified products launched in recent years. We anticipate the fortified food and beverage market will continue to expand, driven by the demand for sustainable food supply while ensuring nutrient completeness. Our biobased creatine is uniquely positioned to meet both angles.
[1] Market Research Intellect: Fortified Foods and Beverages Market size, share and industry analysis 2033
[2] Statista: Size of the functional food market worldwide 2019 to 2027
[3] Ostojic, S. M. Assessing Dietary Creatine Intake in Population Studies: Challenges and Opportunities. Nutrition Reviews (2024) doi:10.1093/NUTRIT/NUAE155.