Seven in ten Americans say protein is the nutrient they’re most actively trying to consume, according to the International Food Information Council’s 2025 Food and Health Survey – the fifth year running that protein topped the list.1
What counts as high protein, though, and how much it matters, still varies widely from one market to the next.
This variation sits within a bigger shift. Shoppers across the continent want less sugar, more protein and greater nutrient density in the products they already buy, without compromising on the foods they love. For manufacturers, that means reformulating faster and more often than ever, while still hitting targets for taste, texture, and shelf life.
Increasingly, this challenge is being addressed by biosolutions, as enzymes, microbes, and cultures work inside a formulation to perform functions that consumers never see.
Biosolutions can help manufacturers make better use of raw materials, reduce waste and improve production efficiency, while addressing some of the competing demands that come with reformulation. As the industry comes under pressure to move faster and formulate smarter, the ability to achieve more without fundamentally changing a product or process matters as much as the health benefit itself.
To explore how this is playing out on the factory floor, and where the biggest opportunities and challenges lie, FoodNavigator spoke to Theis Bacher, Senior Vice President, Food & Beverage Biosolutions, North America, at Novonesis, about what it takes to reformulate for a healthier future and what manufacturers should look for in a biosolutions partner.
Q: How would you describe the shift you’re seeing in what “healthy” means to food and beverage manufacturers today, and how is that changing the reformulation conversations you’re having with them?
We’ve seen a meaningful shift from simply taking things out of food to asking how we can put more value into it. For years, many new products were built around “less”: less fat, fewer calories, less sugar. Those priorities haven’t disappeared, but increasingly the conversation is also about “more”: more protein, more fiber, more nutritional value and more functional benefits. But we’re not willing to sacrifice in the process. Consumers still expect great taste, texture, convenience and affordability.
There is also ongoing societal debate about reducing the use of chemicals and replacing ultra-processed foods with less processed alternatives. That is a very meaningful discussion to have, and Novonesis has had many of our customers reach out for support in helping them achieve many of their objectives within that space.
Some examples include enzymatic solutions that can replace unwanted emulsifiers in baked products or plant-based beverages and cultures that offer a natural way to extend shelf life in many dairy products without the use of chemical preservatives, or make delicious cheeses that stretch, melt or brown perfectly on a pizza.
Finally, the popularity of GLP-1 drugs has clearly impacted the demand for better nutrition, and in North America particularly, we are seeing an explosion in demand for high-protein products such as yogurt, cottage cheese, and beverages in convenient formats that outperform many traditional food categories.
Q: What role do enzymes, microbes and cultures play inside a formulation that most people outside the industry wouldn’t expect?
We typically refer to enzymes, microbes, and cultures as one category that we call biosolutions. Many consumers – and probably many food industry professionals – don’t know how much biosolutions enable unlocking several value drivers into foods and beverages. Biosolutions are tiny but mighty and drive microbial fermentation and enzymatic processes in dairy, meat, baking, brewing, wine, and several other industries. There are hundreds of applications and a few concrete examples include:
- Removing lactose from dairy products
- Improving softness and freshness in bread
- Reducing acrylamide formation in baked foods
- Extending shelf life across various food categories
Q: When a manufacturer wants to boost protein content without turning a product chalky, gritty, or bitter, what does that reformulation process typically involve?
Protein has clearly moved into the mainstream. Higher protein alternatives are a strong trend, especially in the US, but also spreading to Asia, Europe, and South America too.
Consumers are prioritizing protein, but they refuse to compromise on the eating experience. That can create a real formulation challenge. As manufacturers push protein levels higher, for example, from 14g to 15g per serving in a typical Greek yogurt to 20g to 30g in some newer products, maintaining the desired taste, texture and mouthfeel becomes more challenging.
That is where our application expertise and biosolutions come together. We work closely with manufacturers to optimize formulations so they can deliver the higher protein content while both addressing sensory challenges like mouthfeel and texture as well as improving the taste profile by removing chalkiness.
Q: How do biosolutions help brands cut sugar while still delivering the sweetness, texture, and mouthfeel that consumers expect?
We have several biosolutions in our portfolio that enable sugar reduction through various mechanisms. By understanding the application of these microbial solutions, we can maintain the sensory properties of the foods while leveraging the right hydrolysis of complex sugars into smaller ones, which allows sugar reduction in various types of foods and beverages. In fact, we’ve done that for decades in the dairy and baking industries.
Q: What does “nutrient density” mean in practice for a food manufacturer, and how do biosolutions help them get there?
In the past month, we’ve invested resources into understanding what consumers, and in particular GLP-1 users, mean by “nutrient density”. Because of course, if consumers care about it, so do manufacturers.
In practice, nutrient density is about delivering more nutritional value in the foods and beverages people consume – whether that’s more protein, fiber, micronutrients, or other functional benefits. For manufacturers, the challenge is doing that in a way that works in the formulation and still delivers an enjoyable product.
Biosolutions give manufacturers more ways to do that. Enzymes and other biological tools can transform or make better use of components in raw materials. For example, enabling higher whole-grain content without compromising texture or helping turn underused raw materials into valuable protein and peptide ingredients. Probiotics can also be used to create functional foods and beverages.
Our recent investigation indicates that protein, fiber, and gut health are becoming increasingly important. Ultimately, nutrient density is about making the foods people already enjoy work harder for us, and biology gives manufacturers more tools to make that possible.
Q: What does “doing more with less” actually look like on a manufacturer’s production line?
Try to imagine one more batch per day because a new biosolution was implemented; or 2% more cheese yield every day after a new culture is being used; or a significant amount of product waste has been reduced. Quite often it takes a team of Novonesis application experts that work shoulder-to-shoulder with a manufacturer’s operations employees to secure full implementation of a solution so all the benefits of less energy, less waste and less raw materials can be realized.
Q: What formulation or production challenges do you hear about most often from manufacturers right now, and how do biosolutions help them work through those constraints?
There is obviously a lot of talk about ultra-processed foods and reducing chemicals these days, but manufacturers are also trying to solve several dilemmas that need to be addressed at all at the same time. Some examples include, “How can you address food safety while enabling clean label and more natural product formulations?” or “How can you provide affordable products and still have a high protein and fiber content?”.
Biosolutions are well positioned to help manufacturers solve many of these dilemmas.
Q: What should manufacturers look for in a biosolutions partner, and where does Novonesis’s approach set it apart?
Everything we do at Novonesis is backed by strong science due to extensive research, and that is the foundation of our leadership in the ingredients industry. Manufacturers should look for a partner that combines deep science with the application expertise to make that science work in the real world. At Novonesis, we work closely with customers, often collaborating for months or even years to understand their specific formulation or production challenge and develop a biosolution that works in their process.
That combination of science and application expertise is critical, but so is the ability to deliver at scale. We have industry experts around the world and have invested significantly in our global production footprint, helping us provide customers with a reliable supply of biosolutions wherever they operate.
Ultimately, it’s not just about having the right biosolution. It’s about having the expertise to make it work in a customer’s application and the scale to deliver it reliably.
Q: Looking ahead, where do you see the biggest opportunity for biosolutions to reshape how food is made over the next five years?
I think the biggest opportunity is for biology to become a much more fundamental part of how the food industry innovates. For a long time, enzymes, cultures and microbes have been working behind the scenes in food production. What’s changing is the range of challenges we can now address with biology.
Over the next five years, I believe we’ll see food manufacturers look to biosolutions earlier in the innovation process – not just when they need to solve a formulation problem, but when they are asking what a better product or process could look like in the first place.
That’s what makes this moment so exciting. We’ve been harnessing biology in food for more than a century, and we’re still discovering what it can do. In many ways, we’re just getting started.
References
- International Food Information Council. 2025 Food and Health Survey.
