DuPont expands US probiotics pilot facility to improve NPD, delivery times

18 Aug 2017 --- DuPont Nutrition & Health (DuPont) has announced a “substantial upgrade” to its probiotics pilot facility in Madison, Wisconsin, US. The new enhancements will increase its capability for rapidly developing and commercializing new probiotics with decreased time to market. The US$10 million investment allows for increased pace of new product development and significantly improved delivery times on pilot material for clinical trials and customer evaluations, according to DuPont.

Construction on the Madison probiotics pilot area, completed in phases over the last six months, is said to provide increased capacity and speed for new product development. This, in turn, improves overall scale up capability and a more seamless transition to commercial scale production, DuPont’s press release notes.

“Given the explosive rise in demand for probiotics products all around the globe, this project allows us to aggressively pursue our goal to be the No. 1 probiotics supplier in the world,” says DuPont Nutrition & Health President Matthias Heinzel. “These expansion efforts show our commitment to becoming bigger and stronger with our capability to meet demand, and our facilities, and qualified staff to handle the significant growth we foresee in this sector.”

The pilot area features new, state-of-the-art equipment, data collection, laboratories, instrumentation and specialized work space for probiotic development and scale-up. The company reports that the upgrades that quadrupled the pilot area have already increased bandwidth to simultaneously run more development projects while improving scale up efficiency and time to market.

“With all the enhancements, we are better able to meet customer demand for new probiotics at a much faster pace,” says Kurt Fenster, BioProcess Development Group Manager, Culture Manufacturing Technology at DuPont Nutrition & Health. “Moving forward, we expect to substantially increase our speed to deliver products to customers.”

Exciting times for probiotics
The announcement comes at a time when DuPont’s probiotics products have recently been in the news, as food products from the DuPont Danisco range have been recorded with the Japanese Consumer Affairs Agency for Food with Function Claims. A DuPont probiotic strain has been found by a study to support respiratory immune function, while the company has also launched HOWARU Shape, a probiotic that has been clinically proven to reduce waist circumference in overweight adults.

Investigating the future of the wider probiotics space, NutritionInsight has also recently discussed possible probiotic applications with President & CEO Michael Bush of Ganeden and Lallemand Health Solutions Product Manager Lucie Lingrand.