Bio­tech­no­logy com­pany ÄIO suc­cess­fully pro­duces first tonne of its yeast-based altern­at­ive to tra­di­tion­al oils for cos­met­ics and food applications

TALLINN, Esto­nia (Septem­ber 16^th, 2025) ÄIO, an Esto­ni­an bio­tech­no­logy com­pany devel­op­ing sus­tain­able, non-anim­al fats and non-veget­able oils through innov­at­ive pre­ci­sion fer­ment­a­tion pro­cesses, has suc­cess­fully com­pleted its first full-scale pro­duc­tion run of its encap­su­lated oil product, reach­ing a volume of 1 tonne. The mile­stone rep­res­ents a 300-fold increase from the company’s labor­at­ory cap­ab­il­it­ies, pos­i­tion­ing ÄIO to address the grow­ing demand for more nat­ur­al altern­at­ives to unsus­tain­able, envir­on­ment­ally pol­lut­ing, and poten­tially harm­ful ingredi­ents that have long been used through­out the cos­met­ics and food man­u­fac­tur­ing industries.

ÄIO uses bio­mass and pre­ci­sion fer­ment­a­tion to trans­form indus­tri­al side streams into nutri­ent-rich oils and fats. The company’s encap­su­lated oil, high in pro­teins, fibres, and func­tion­al lip­ids, offers an eco-con­scious altern­at­ive to palm and coconut oil, eggs, and even cocoa powder. In cos­met­ics for­mu­la­tions, it provides nour­ish­ing prop­er­ties with addi­tion­al bio­act­ive bene­fits, act­ing as a nat­ur­al altern­at­ive to pet­ro­leum-derived min­er­al oils, which can be harm­ful to the skin and cause envir­on­ment­al pol­lu­tion. In food applic­a­tions, it deliv­ers an umami taste and a ver­sat­ile tex­ture pro­file, mak­ing it suit­able for a wide range of products, from meat-free pat­ties to confectionery.

“This is not just a pro­duc­tion mile­stone, it’s a val­id­a­tion of a dream,” says Nemailla Bon­turi, ÄIO’s CEO and co-founder. ​“As a sci­ent­ist, I’ve been devel­op­ing this fer­ment­a­tion pro­cess since 2013. See­ing some­thing that I star­ted in a small lab in Brazil now being pro­duced at this scale in Europe is incred­ibly reward­ing. This first tonne is the first of many to come, and cru­cially, it proves our pro­cess can scale bey­ond pilot set­tings and val­id­ates the com­mer­cial poten­tial we’re work­ing toward.”

The pro­duc­tion run, com­pleted between late 2024 and mid-2025, comes as indus­tries face mount­ing pres­sure to reduce envir­on­ment­al impact. For example, reports indic­ate that palm oil cul­tiv­a­tion drives approx­im­ately 10% of glob­al defor­est­a­tion, while the World Wild­life Fund reports that cur­rent food pro­duc­tion sys­tems have con­trib­uted to a 70% decline in ter­restri­al biod­iversity since 1970.

In the cos­met­ics sec­tor, man­u­fac­tur­ers are under increas­ing pres­sure to seek nat­ur­al altern­at­ives to com­monly used pet­ro­chem­ic­al ingredi­ents. Reports indic­ate that the beauty industry could stand to lose around €12 bil­lion (US$13 bil­lion) due to the EU micro­plastics ban and increas­ing pres­sure call­ing to out­law PFAS, also known as ​“forever chem­ic­als,” which are already restric­ted in the US.

“The fun­da­ment­al eco­nom­ics have shif­ted,” Bon­turi explains. ​“Five years ago, sus­tain­able altern­at­ives car­ried a sig­ni­fic­ant price premi­um. Today, sup­ply chain dis­rup­tions and reg­u­lat­ory pres­sures have cre­ated con­di­tions where pre­ci­sion fer­ment­a­tion can achieve cost par­ity with con­ven­tion­al oils while elim­in­at­ing envir­on­ment­al and eth­ic­al con­cerns. For man­u­fac­tur­ers, eco­lo­gic­ally con­scious ingredi­ents are no longer a ​‘nice-to-have’, they’re a necessity.”

With the tonne-scale mile­stone achieved, ÄIO is now pre­par­ing for its next major goal: estab­lish­ing a com­mer­cial pro­duc­tion facil­ity cap­able of pro­du­cing 2,000 tonnes annu­ally. The com­pany has com­pleted pre-engin­eer­ing concept work for this facil­ity and is devel­op­ing part­ner­ships with com­pan­ies involving feed­stock sup­ply, dis­tri­bu­tion, and off-take agreements.

“Scal­ing the pro­duc­tion closer to com­mer­cial levels allows ÄIO to val­id­ate and optim­ize our pro­duc­tion tech­no­logy and its effi­ciency,” says Mar­tin Mets, CFO at ÄIO. ​“We have already reduced our unit costs by 80% in the last years, through scale and optim­iz­a­tion, and we expect to con­tin­ue with a sim­il­ar cost reduc­tion curve for the fore­see­able years. The one tonne mile­stone high­lights the great pro­gress our team has made in real­iz­ing fer­ment­a­tion tech­no­logy that is a feas­ible and cost-com­pet­it­ive altern­at­ive to cur­rent unsus­tain­able sources.”

ÄIO has already begun shar­ing product samples with man­u­fac­tur­ers in both food and per­son­al care, with ini­tial interest from pro­du­cers seek­ing to reduce their envir­on­ment­al foot­print while main­tain­ing product per­form­ance. The com­pany also plans to launch a new fun­drais­ing round by late 2026 to accel­er­ate its expan­sion and cap­ture growth in the altern­at­ive fats and oils mar­ket, fore­cas­ted to reach $4.5 bil­lion by 2032.

“We’re now show­ing that the com­mer­cial viab­il­ity for plant-based altern­at­ives to tra­di­tion­al oils is very real. We’re ready to bring these bene­fits to the world, prov­ing that our tech­no­logy can deliv­er sus­tain­able altern­at­ives at the scale needed to make a real impact on glob­al food sys­tems and oth­er indus­tri­al applic­a­tions across entire product cat­egor­ies,” Bon­turi concludes.