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Bringing to the market the new generation of yogurts with encapsulated ingredients

Project description

An innovative turn in flavoured yogurts

Rising awareness about healthy food has driven the yogurt market to new heights. The global flavoured yogurt market, for instance, is expected to surpass EUR 100 billion by 2026. Flavoured yogurts, however, tend to lose their original ingredient’s flavour and become diluted. To avoid this, new ranges of yogurts were invented, with multiple layers, or with packages that have multiple compartments, which is more expensive to produce. The EU-funded Impearl project has another solution: a very thin, edible, impermeable, pasteurised and tasteless capsule that contains a pure flavour, which is mixed in the yogurt and releases its content when consumed. Not only does this reduce plastic waste (removing the need for multi-compartment packaging), it also simplifies production lines and allows for pasteurised ingredients, which increases food safety.

Objective

Improveat aims at disrupting the market of food ingredients by providing a novel product with unseen features in food industry. In a first stage, impearl will revolutionize the yogurt market (our primary target market), but we intend to apply impearl in other food products such as cheese and ice cream.

Until now, flavoured yogurts tended to lose their original ingredient’s flavour and get diluted. To avoid this, new ranges of
yogurts were invented, with multiple layers, or with packages that have multiple compartments, more expensive to produce.
Impearl is the new paradigm of flavoured yogurts – a very thin, edible, impermeable, pasteurized and tasteless capsule that
contains a pure flavour, which is mixed in the yogurt and releases its content when consumed.

Impearl contributes to reducing plastic waste (direct insertion of encapsulated ingredients removes the need for multicompartment
packaging) in the yogurt industry, and simplifies production lines, for greater operational efficiency. It also
allows for pasteurization of ingredients, increasing food safety.

Our business model is B2B, selling impearl to yogurt producers. Yogurts are one of the main products of the dairy industry,
and represent around € 75 000 million worldwide, of which 39% in Europe – we consider France and Germany our initial
markets (16% of EU market). Impearl can be integrated into a range of yoghurts with a higher market value, and we have
received interest from Müller (german-based international company) and Frulact (Portugal) in testing our product in their
yogurts.

Improveat was born in 2013 out of a group of four biological with training and PhD in the field of food technology
who work daily to solve existing needs in the food industry.

Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)

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Programme(s)

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Topic(s)

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Funding Scheme

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SME-1 - SME instrument phase 1

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Call for proposal

Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.

(opens in new window) H2020-EIC-SMEInst-2018-2020

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Coordinator

IMPROVEAT LDA
Net EU contribution

Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.

€ 50 000,00
Address
Rua de São victor, n 54, 2º
4710 - 439 Braga
Portugal

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SME

The organization defined itself as SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) at the time the Grant Agreement was signed.

Yes
Region
Continente Norte Cávado
Activity type
Private for-profit entities (excluding Higher or Secondary Education Establishments)
Links
Total cost

The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.

€ 71 429,00
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