GEA to supply and commission precision‑fermentation upscaling line for BFF in the Netherlands
GEA has been chosen to design, deliver and commission a full precision‑ and biomass‑fermentation upscaling line for the Biotechnology Fermentation Factory (BFF), the open‑access pilot facility located on the NIZO Food Innovation Campus in Ede, the Netherlands.
The installation is planned for 2026, with pilot‑scale operations expected to begin in 2027.
The new line will provide food and ingredient developers with a food‑grade, mid‑scale environment to test, validate and scale a wide range of biotechnology‑enabled products, including animal‑free dairy and egg proteins, specialty enzymes, flavours, fragrances and other functional biomolecules.
Frederieke Reiners, vice president New Food at GEA, said the project fills a critical gap in the market: “Open‑access capacity is the missing development link for many innovators. By delivering BFF’s upscaling line, we enable teams to validate processes faster under food‑grade conditions. As the natural next step after proof‑of‑concept work at our GEA New Food Application & Technology Center, this pilot environment will generate application‑ready material and decision‑grade data that de‑risk the transition to commercial manufacturing. It also advances Mission 30, where biotechnology meets scalable industrial production.”
Marcel Oogink, managing director of BFF Ede, added: “Our goal is simple: to give the industry reliable, open‑access capacity to validate processes under realistic, food‑grade and scalable conditions. With GEA supplying this line, companies gain the technical confidence and speed they need to move from lab development toward industrial readiness.”
Closing the scale‑up gap
Many precision‑ and biomass‑fermentation ventures struggle to bridge the space between lab‑scale proof‑of‑concept and the first commercial investment decision. BFF’s open‑access model is designed to solve this bottleneck by offering a single, coherent validation environment that reduces tech‑transfer risk, accelerates time‑to‑validation and supports Europe’s shift toward biotechnology‑enabled food production.
Companies can book fermentation capacity, access process expertise and run pilot campaigns without building their own facility. Operating under food‑grade standards, BFF can produce trial volumes suitable for sensory evaluation, application testing and downstream product development.
Integrated, food‑grade workflow
GEA’s system will centre on 1,000‑litre and 10,000‑litre fermenters, forming a complete upstream‑to‑downstream line that includes media preparation, controlled fermentation, cell harvest and a filtration train for recovery and polishing. GEA will also provide commissioning and validation support, ensuring companies can generate robust, decision‑grade data while maintaining full confidentiality over organisms, recipes and commercial parameters.
The new line complements BFF’s existing pre‑pilot assets and biomass‑fermentation capabilities, and connects directly to the downstream processing (DSP) pilot plant at NIZO. This allows teams to run fermentation, primary recovery and professional‑scale concentration and purification in one integrated location – creating one of Europe’s most comprehensive mid‑scale, food‑grade validation environments for precision and biomass fermentation.
