BLUU Seafood opens new headquarters in Hamburg with Europe’s first pilot plant for cultivated fish, prepares for market entry

• company relocates from Lübeck to Hamburg
• state-of-the-art cell and molecular biology laboratories, process development space, and test kitchen for food applications on around 2,000 square meters

Hamburg / Berlin, Germany. 11 April 2024. BLUU Seafood, Europe’s leading food biotech company in the production of cultivated fish, today officially opened the doors to the first pilot plant in Europe. By relocating from Lübeck to Hamburg-Altona, the start-up company has left laboratory scale behind and exchanged it for 2,000 square meters of customized research, production, and office space to develop and produce real and tasty fish products – without any animal suffering or environmental damage. The new fermenters, which currently have a capacity of 65 liters with the potential to expand to 2,000 liters, will enable BLUU Seafood to cultivate muscle, fat and connective tissue cells from Atlantic salmon and rainbow trout in much larger quantities than before.

At the optimal temperature, with the necessary oxygen supply and the appropriate nutrients, the animal cells grow and divide in the same way as they do in live fish. The fish products made from the cell mass, such as fish sticks or fish balls, are both GMO-free and free from heavy metals and microplastics often found in wild-caught fish. They are similar to conventional products in terms of taste, nutritional content, and cooking behavior.

With the new plant and the associated scale-up, BLUU Seafood is taking the next step towards industrial production. Dr Sebastian Rakers, co-founder and co-CEO, explained: “With the facilities at our new site, we can continue to develop our products and prepare intensively for the future market entry of cultivated fish. We are thus laying the foundations to supply the first markets. In Hamburg, we have the ideal conditions to continue to grow and continuously reduce production costs.”

At present, the cost of producing cultivated fish is still higher than the average price of wild and farmed fish, but this will gradually change as capacity increases. “We will only see a real shift towards a more sustainable diet when products based on alternative proteins are available in larger quantities and are also affordable. That is what we are working on at BLUU,” said Rakers. “If the scalability and market conditions are favorable, we will be able to offer cultivated fish at wholesale fish prices in as little as three years. The new site is an important building block in this development.”

Although, at a cellular level, cultivated fish is no different from wild-caught or farmed fish, it is considered a new food and is thoroughly tested in all markets before being approved. This ensures food safety. Initial approvals for cultivated chicken, quail, and beef have already been granted in Singapore, the US and Israel. For cultivated fish, approval conditions have also been defined by the relevant authorities. BLUU Seafood therefore expects the first approval in Singapore in early 2025, followed by the US and the European Union.

About Bluu Seafood

The food biotech company BLUU Seafood is the first company in Europe to specialize in the commercial production of cultivated fish. As a pioneer at the interface between cell and food technology, BLUU Seafood aims to produce healthy, sustainable, and tasty fish products from cell cultures. The aim is to produce fish cost-effectively and without animal suffering, thus making a significant contribution to climate and species protection. The technology can also help to secure the future supply of animal protein for humans. The start-up company, which has offices in Hamburg and Berlin, was founded in Lübeck in 2020 by Dr Sebastian Rakers and Simon Fabich with a team of experts consisting of marine and cell biologists as well as tissue and food technicians. In 2023, Fabian Friede joined the C-level team as Co-CEO. Molecular biologist Dr Christian Dammann is Chief Technical Officer. BLUU Seafood has 35 employees from 13 different countries. For more information, please visit www.bluu.bio.