News

Meet the finalists of the Fi Europe Innovation Awards 2025

Who made it to the shortlist of the Fi Europe Innovation Awards 2025? Read about the 23 companies making food and drink products healthier and manufacturing processes more efficient.

Winners of the Innovation Awards will be announced at a special ceremony celebrating Fi Europe's 30th edition on Tuesday, 2 December, at Paris Expo Porte de Versailles.

Read about all the finalists and their entries below.

Finalists of the Dairy Alternative Innovation Award

This award recognises an organisation or company that has developed the best plant-based dairy alternative ingredient, or application based on a plant-based dairy alternative ingredient, in terms of sensory and physical properties or application costs.

Ajinomoto Foods Europe for its ingredient ACTIVA DA, a combination of three enzymes designed to improve the texture of plant-based semi-hard cheeses. The ingredient improves the shreddability of plant-based cheese to facilitate industrial steps such as grating, while also improving the stretchability and meltability after heating.

Lipidos Santiga for its ingredient Kaolip Duo, a milk fat alternative for superior confectionery coatings. Kaolip Duo is a 100% plant-based, allergen-free, lactose- and trans fat-free ingredient for dairy-free coatings. It delivers harder, more stable coatings than traditional milk fat coatings and supercoatings, with faster crystallisation and reduced risk of fat bloom.

Time-travelling Milkman for Oleocream, a one-to-one replacer for dairy cream made entirely from sunflower seeds and water. Its formulation mimics the sensory profile of dairy cream while offering scalable, sustainable, and versatile functionality across applications from cream cheese to sauces and desserts.

Lallemand Bio-Ingredients for Engevita HiPRO Beyond, an ingredient to maximise the protein content in dairy-alternative drinks. Engevita HiPRO Beyond has an 80% protein content and all essential amino acids, helping formulators boost the nutritional value of ready-to-drink beverages, achieving more than 10% protein content with ease. It also disperses quickly in liquid without gelling or thickening the drink.

Finalists of the Food Manufacturing Innovation Award

This award recognises an organisation or company that has developed innovative food manufacturing or packaging equipment that improves manufacturing efficiency, reduces waste, and/or enhances product safety.

Handary for its ingredient Hékôn Microporous Membrane, a heavy-ion microporous membrane designed to preserve fresh produce quality. Its dual-layer structure – a protective substrate bonded to a microporous membrane – enables dynamic O₂/CO₂ regulation while blocking microorganisms and particulates.

Tetra Pak for its Air Jet Cleaning system for powder handling equipments which, unlike conventional CIP methods that use liquids, instead uses the power of air jets. This technology cleans fast with minimal residual powder so that manufacturers can switch from one recipe to another quickly.

Tetra Pak for its Industrial Protein Mixer, a product designed to reduce product loss in liquid protein mixing. A response to the longstanding issue of foaming during the mixing phase of liquid food products, this solution aims to improve food and beverage manufacturers’ operational efficiency.

Hosokawa Alpine for Alpine Microburst AMB, a spiral jet mill for ultrafine grinding of coarse and fibrous materials without pre-crushing. Its central material inlet offers advantages over conventional injector-based mills, which limit feed and require pre-shredding, especially for natural products.

Finalists of the Future Foodtech Innovation Award

This award recognises an organisation or company that has developed an innovative processing or bioprocessing technology solution or service, including the applications of artificial intelligence, that has the potential to improve the production, the functionality, and/or cost of food ingredients.

Amano Enzyme for Plants Unlimited, a next-generation platform delivering targeted, clean-label enzyme solutions for plant-based innovation. The company says that Plants Unlimited solves stability, foaming, and sweetness issues without artificial additives, enabling premium sensory quality and regulatory compliance.

AKA Food for its Intelligence Platform for Application Development, which integrates critical data sources and uses AI to empower application development professionals to pitch innovative concepts, product prototypes, and solutions in response to customer briefs.

Tetra Pak for its whole oat beverages lines, which use 100% of oat grain, versus the normal 80%. This means that the whole oats line delivers around 60% more protein and around 200% more fibre than alternatives, with zero fibre waste.

Finalists of the Health Innovation Award

This award recognises an organisation or company for the development of the best ingredient or application in terms of proven contribution to gut, immune, cognitive, emotional, or physical health.

NIZO Food Research for its Gut-Brain Axis on Chip, a novel human assay to assess nutrition-mediated brain health. The result of a collaboration between the University of Twente and NIZO Food Research, this human organ-on-chip model simulates the gut-brain axis. Made using stem cell-derived tissues and microfluidic technology, the model enables systematic, animal-free testing of how dietary ingredients affect brain health.

Nu-Mega Ingredients for Gelphorm, a novel DHA emulsion for UHT drinks. The double microencapsulated DHA ingredient designed specifically for UHT dairy and dairy-alternative products allows manufacturers to achieve high DHA levels while maintaining sensory quality and ensuring a minimum 12-month shelf life.

ADM International for Lactobacillus Gasseri CP2305, a postbiotic that is postulated to modulate stress via the vagus nerve, offering innovation in mental wellness through gut-brain communication. As a stable, non-living cell derived from probiotics, it is formulation-friendly and suitable for use in products exposed to heat, moisture, or pressure.

Finalists of the Plant-Based Innovation Award

This award recognises an organisation or company that has developed the best plant-based ingredient, or application based on a plant-based ingredient, in terms of sensory and physical properties or application costs.

Relsus Pte for its technology RELSUS Ultra-Precise Filtration. The technology removes most impurities, making proteins 100% digestible with exceptional organoleptic properties. RELSUS functional proteins – PeaTein and ChanaTein – have outperformed benchmark samples of other functional proteins in internationally acknowledged labs.

ICL Food Specialties for ROVITARIS SprouTx, a textured soy protein that addresses the sensory challenges of soy protein by using the power of germination. It has reduced off-flavours, enhanced umami taste, improved fibrous texture, optimised nutrition, and shortened hydration time compared with other textured proteins on the market.

Handary for PhosRice, a rice bran extract made from glutinous rice, Tsuyahime rice, and Oryza sativa bran, produced via high-pressure cold pressing. Naturally rich in proteins, phytic acid, and dietary fibre, the extract enhances water retention, texture, gelation, tenderisation, and antioxidant stability, and can replace inorganic phosphates in seafood, processed meat, and poultry.

Reborn Biotech for Clear Pea Protein, a plant-based protein for clear beverages and functional foods. Made from peas, it delivers excellent taste, clean-label appeal, and enhanced nutritional benefits. With exceptional dispersibility in both hot and cold applications, it allows formulators to create clear beverages, protein-enriched products, and functional foods without compromising sensory quality, the company says.

Royal Avebe for its ingredient PerfectaGEL, a modified potato starch that reduces drying time of vegan, starch-based gummies by up to 50%, enabling higher efficiency, lower cost-in-use, and more sustainable operations. The ingredient is also easy to integrate into existing recipes and yields stable, high-quality textures.

Finalists of the Sustainability Innovation Award

This award recognises an organisation or company for a measurable supply system that demonstrates environmental, economic, and/or socially sustainable practices in the food and beverage industry.

IFF for CHOOZIT LIFT cultures. Based on a patented formulation designed to naturally reduce the lactose level of whey, these ready-to-use cultures can eliminate up to 100% of water used for curd washing, while ensuring a homogenous taste without bitterness and delivering measurable sustainability benefits for semi-hard cheese producers.

Saipol for its Empreinte range of low-carbon refined rapeseed and sunflower oils, sourced from French seeds grown using regenerative agricultural practices. By 2030, Saipol intends to shift 30% of its sourcing to this programme, offering a tangible lever for food manufacturers’ responsible sourcing and environmental strategies.

ADM for its regenerative agriculture collaborations across Europe. ADM says it has a farmer-centric approach that delivers education, incentives, and innovation to empower growers while improving soil health, reducing emissions, and strengthening biodiversity.

ofi for its Cocoa Compass, its sustainability ambition for cocoa, which sets goals for 2030 and reports on its progress. Since its launch, ofi says its cocoa business has established child labour monitoring in all managed programmes, achieved 100% traceability and deforestation monitoring in its direct supply chain, and that 44,000 farmers in its supply chain earn a living income.

A world-renowned panel of judges

The Fi Europe Innovation Awards prides itself on its judging panel, made up of independent industry experts from around the world.

Judges include Professor Colin Dennis, chair of International Food Information Service (IFIS); Nicolas Bordenave, research director at INRAE; João Brites, director of growth and innovation at HowGood; and Barbara Bray, food safety and nutrition consultant at Alo Solutions.