Arkeon Biotechnologies Opens Pilot Production Facility to Bring CO2 Proteins to Market – vegconomist

Arkeon Biotechnologies, an Austrian startup converting CO2 into functional protein ingredients, announces it has achieved a significant milestone in its production process after successfully setting up a new pilot production plant.

Located in Vienna’s Seestadt Innovation Hub, the new facility expands the company’s infrastructure with a 150L bioreactor system that, according to Arkeon, will improve its process and lay the biotechnological foundation for future large-scale production.

Last year, Arkeon Biotechnologies unveiled its revolutionary new tech, which is capable of transforming CO2 into proteins. Its advanced process requires 99% less land and only 0.01% of the amount of water needed by traditional agriculture. Moreover, the microorganism fed with the gas fermentation technique is able to generate all 20 essential amino acids, explains the startup.

The pilot plant was built in cooperation with Sedlak, Steamtec, Böhm Stadtbaumeister & Gebäudetechnik GmbH, Kanzler-Dach, Bioengineering AG, Gasulting, RW and Serviceteam among others.

Expanding capacity

Arkeon Biotechnologies also announced that it has commissioned a 3000L bioreactor, scheduled for the end of 2024 that will mark the company’s entry into commercial production capacity, producing tons of goods. The Austrian startup says that it has already partnered with global companies to develop innovative protein applications for F&B products.

The future demo facility will be located at the Technology Centre Seestadt, a project that aims to create more production and office space for new startups, such as Arkeon. The center is currently under construction by the Vienna Business Agency.

Arkeon’s revolutionary proteins have attracted various investors, including ICL, aws Gründerfonds, FoodHack and Tet Ventures. In March 2022, the company raised a seed funding of €‎6.5 million to further develop its process and last December, announced it had secured another four million euros to convert CO2 into food and build a new R&D center.

“The successful implementation of our pilot production plant represents a solid basis and illustrates that our company has set up the technical foundation to unlock our production technology at large scale. It is an essential step on our way to scale to large commercial production outputs”, says  Dr. Günther Bochmann, Technological Project Lead of Arkeon.