BLUU Sea­food opens pilot plant for cell-based fish in the EU

In a former mar­zipan fact­ory in Ham­burg-Altona, the food tech start-up BLUU Sea­food will be driv­ing for­ward the pro­duc­tion of cul­tured fish from now on. With the relo­ca­tion of the site from Lübeck to the met­ro­pol­is on the Alster, the com­pany is also leav­ing the labor­at­ory scale and open­ing its first pilot plant. ​“With the pos­sib­il­it­ies at our new site, we can con­tin­ue to drive for­ward the devel­op­ment of our products and intens­ively pre­pare the future mar­ket entry with cul­tiv­ated fish. We are thus lay­ing the found­a­tions for sup­ply­ing the first mar­kets. In Ham­burg, we have the ideal con­di­tions for fur­ther growth and con­tinu­ous reduc­tion of pro­duc­tion costs,” explains founder and Man­aging Dir­ect­or Sebasti­an Rakers.

State-of-the-art tech­no­logy on 2,000 square metres

The new pro­duc­tion facil­ity in Ham­burg cov­ers around 2,000 square metres and offers the team state-of-the-art cell and molecu­lar bio­logy labor­at­or­ies, pro­cess devel­op­ment rooms and a test kit­chen for the newly developed foods. The cell-based fish products are also pro­duced in a new fer­menter, whose cur­rent capa­city of 65 litres can be expan­ded to up to 2,000 litres. 

Accord­ing to BLUU Sea­food, this enables it to ​“cul­tiv­ate muscle, fat and con­nect­ive tis­sue cells from Atlantic sal­mon and rain­bow trout in sig­ni­fic­antly lar­ger quant­it­ies than before”.

The com­pany, which was foun­ded in 2020, aims to rebal­ance the over­fished oceans with products made from cul­tiv­ated fish cells. The first cell-based fish products, fish fin­gers and fish balls, were ready for the mar­ket in 2022. At the optim­um tem­per­at­ure and with the appro­pri­ate oxy­gen and nutri­ent sup­ply, the fish cells would grow in exactly the same way as they do in live fish, the com­pany writes. The advant­age of the cell-based fish products pro­duced in the biore­act­or: In terms of fla­vour and nutri­tion­al con­tent as well as cook­ing beha­viour, cul­tured fish resembles the anim­al mod­el. How­ever, unlike con­ven­tion­al fish products, neither anim­als nor the envir­on­ment are harmed. The products are also free from heavy metals and micro­plastics and are GMO-free.

On the way to indus­tri­al production

With the new facil­ity in Ham­burg-Altona, the pro­cess is now ready to be scaled up and thus take the next step towards indus­tri­al pro­duc­tion. ​“If the scal­ing options and frame­work con­di­tions are right, we will be able to offer cul­tiv­ated fish at whole­sale fish prices in just three years’ time. The new site is an import­ant build­ing block in this devel­op­ment,” said Sebasti­an Rakers. He is con­vinced that the nutri­tion­al turn­around can only suc­ceed ​“if products based on altern­at­ive pro­teins are avail­able in lar­ger quant­it­ies and are also affordable”.

In mid-2023, the young com­pany raised 16 mil­lion euros in a fin­an­cing round. The cap­it­al will be used to fur­ther advance work on its pion­eer­ing tech­no­logy and the mar­ket launch of its first products.

Approv­al of first products in Singa­pore in early 2025

Unlike in Singa­pore and the USA, cell-based meat, dairy and fish products are not yet author­ised in the EU. BLUU Sea­food expects the first author­isa­tion in Singa­pore at the begin­ning of 2025, with the USA and the European Uni­on to follow.