Bestzyme builds automated sweet protein line in China

INTRODUCTION

Bestzyme has completed an automated sweet protein line in Jinan. The plant moves fermentation-made brazzein towards commercial supply, although the company has not disclosed its production costs or independent performance data.

Bestzyme, a Chinese biotechnology company owned by GenScript Biotech, makes brazzein through precision fermentation. Green Queen reported on 23 September 2026 that the equipment sits inside the company’s 5,000-square-metre site in Jinan. Bestzyme says the system is the first commercial line dedicated solely to sweet proteins. The publication supplies no independent evidence for that distinction. At full operation, the business expects annual output of 100 tonnes of its Mellia ingredient, according to Green Queen. Bestzyme equates that volume with the sweetening power of 300,000 tonnes of sucrose.

The scale matters because natural extraction cannot provide large amounts of brazzein. The protein occurs in the West African Oubli fruit, but remote growing areas, slow collection and low recovery make harvesting impractical for mass supply, Green Queen says. Fermentation offers another route. It also brings familiar problems in strain performance, purification, consistency and cost. Bestzyme says its new equipment addresses those constraints. The US Food and Drug Administration has already reviewed Mellia, while Chinese clearance remains pending, according to the same publication. The plant can therefore make an approved ingredient for one major market before securing access to its home market.

CORE FINDING

Bestzyme’s central claim concerns integration rather than the presence of a fermenter. The company says the Jinan operation combines strain research, commercial production and work on customer formulations. Its equipment covers fermentation, purification and freeze-drying, according to Green Queen. Automated controls monitor the fermentation stage, while cleanrooms support the later processing steps. Bestzyme says these systems improve yield, batch consistency and purity. The source provides no audited production records to test those assertions.

The company plans to increase the stated capacity twofold within two years, Green Queen reports. It expects to do this through repeated changes to production strains and further process improvements. No capital budget, equipment expansion plan or timetable for reaching full utilisation appears in the supplied material. The announced capacity therefore describes a target rather than proven annual output. A factory can possess nominal volume without operating continuously or selling everything it makes. The distinction is less glamorous than a ribbon cutting, but rather more useful.

SCALE

Brazzein carries unusually high sweetening power. Bestzyme describes it as having no calories and little effect on blood glucose, Green Queen reports. The company says the protein tastes between 500 and 2,000 times sweeter than sucrose. That wide range implies that formulation and product conditions affect the amount required. The supplied sources do not explain the test methods, reference concentrations or sensory panels behind the comparison. They also provide no independent nutritional assessment of Mellia.

Its concentration changes the scale question. Food manufacturers would need far less brazzein by weight than sugar if the company’s sweetness ratio holds in finished products. That does not establish commercial parity. A high-intensity ingredient still carries fermentation, recovery, drying and formulation costs. Green Queen gives no selling price for Mellia and no comparison with stevia, monk fruit or conventional sugar. The reported output figure therefore shows physical ambition, not unit economics.

PROCESS

Precision fermentation starts by giving microbes genetic instructions for a target molecule. The organisms then make that molecule during cultivation. Green Queen says low expression by host cells has limited previous sweet protein work. Separation and purification also raise costs after fermentation. Those barriers have kept many projects at laboratory or pilot scale, according to the publication. Bestzyme says its background in industrial enzymes and biocatalytic production helped it design around these constraints.

The company attributes its proposed gains to three linked steps. It develops strains intended to produce higher yields. It then grows them at high density. Finally, it uses crystallisation to separate the protein at high purity, Green Queen reports. Automation extends across the production sequence rather than controlling only cultivation. That arrangement could reduce manual variation between batches. Yet the source gives no recovery percentage, fermentation titre, run time, failure rate or purity result. Those omissions prevent comparison with other production systems.

APPLICATIONS

Bestzyme does not present Mellia simply as a direct replacement for every gram of sugar. It proposes combining the protein with sweeteners such as stevia and monk fruit, according to Green Queen. The intended role is to improve the overall taste while preserving a sugar-free formulation. Aixi Bai, Bestzyme’s general manager, argues that sugar reduction must reproduce the rounded taste associated with sucrose. That is a commercial position from the ingredient supplier, not a sensory finding reported by an independent study.

Different foods also complicate the pitch. Hua Mao, senior partner and managing director at Frost & Sullivan Greater China, said at the opening event that sweet proteins behave differently across product formats, Green Queen reports. Their sweetness can emerge at different speeds and interact with other flavours. Mao identified carbonated drinks, plant-based dairy alternatives and confectionery as examples. Bestzyme served sugar-free sparkling water and pressed sweets at the event, according to the publication. These samples show intended uses, but the supplied account includes no consumer testing results.

The company offers formulation work alongside ingredient supply. Green Queen says its application team uses sensory evaluation to tailor blends and adjust flavour for customer products. Bestzyme claims this support can cut product development schedules by several months. No customer data substantiate that time saving. The service model still addresses a practical issue. Manufacturers buying a potent protein need to understand dosage, flavour release and interactions with each product base. Powder alone does not answer those questions.

HEALTH CONTEXT

Green Queen links the ingredient’s US opportunity to sugar intake and chronic disease. The publication says Americans consume 17 teaspoons of sugar each day. It also cites a survey in which 45% of respondents named sugar as the ingredient they most wanted to reduce that year. More than half of Generation Z and millennial consumers regarded alternative sweeteners as equally healthy or healthier than sugar, according to the same account. The source does not identify the surveys, their sample sizes or their methods.

Official health data offer firmer context, though they do not test brazzein. The National Center for Health Statistics found age-adjusted obesity prevalence of 41.9% among US adults aged 20 and above in its 2017 to March 2020 prepandemic files. Severe obesity affected 9.2% of that group, according to the report. Diabetes prevalence reached 14.8%. Green Queen gives a lower figure of more than 11% specifically for type 2 diabetes. Those numbers do not directly conflict because the official measure covers diabetes generally, while the publication refers to one form of the disease.

The same federal report found age-adjusted hypertension prevalence of 45.1% among adults aged at least 18. Among children and adolescents aged two to 19, obesity prevalence stood at 19.7%, according to the National Center for Health Statistics. Dental decay, whether untreated or restored, affected 46.0% of that younger group. These figures describe population health before widespread transmission of COVID-19. They do not show that Mellia prevents obesity, diabetes, hypertension or dental disease. Neither supplied source reports a clinical trial of the ingredient.

EVIDENCE

The federal estimates require some care because the pandemic interrupted data collection. National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey fieldwork stopped in March 2020, the National Center for Health Statistics says. The incomplete 2019 to March 2020 sample could not represent the country on its own. Researchers combined it with information collected in 2017 and 2018. They then reassigned primary sampling units to earlier design strata and adjusted participant weights to balance each stratum’s contribution.

Researchers tested the resulting interview weights against demographic estimates from the 2018 five-year American Community Survey, according to the health statistics report. They calculated prevalence measures with 95% confidence intervals. The combined files became the final National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey data gathered before broad COVID-19 transmission. This method supports national estimates for that period. It does not support Green Queen’s claim that sugar habits caused the reported obesity burden, nor does it establish a health benefit from replacing sugar with a fermented protein.

REGULATION

Bestzyme received a no-questions letter for Mellia from the US Food and Drug Administration in 2025, Green Queen reports. That step allows the company to sell the ingredient to US manufacturers. Bestzyme has since partnered with an unnamed sparkling water brand on a sugar-free product, according to the publication. The source does not identify the brand, launch date, distribution plan or commercial volume. Regulatory access has therefore moved ahead of publicly documented market performance.

Several other producers already have sweet protein clearances. Oobli holds US approval for three such proteins, Green Queen says. MycoTechnology can sell a version derived from Hungarian honey truffles. Amai Proteins has received clearance for monellin in the US, Singapore and Israel. Perfect Day, Sweegen and Microfarmtory also hold approvals, according to the publication. Pentasweet, meanwhile, is constructing a brazzein facility in Lithuania valued at $76 million. Bestzyme faces a developing supplier field rather than an empty category.

LIMITS

The strongest counter-argument is that installed equipment does not prove low-cost output. Bestzyme says its system resolves poor yields, unstable batches and prohibitive expense. Green Queen provides no cost per kilogram, customer order book, utilisation rate or production validation from an outside party. The factory’s automation may improve control, but the evidence supplied cannot show whether Mellia competes on price with other high-intensity sweeteners.

Regulatory review also answers only part of the commercial question. US clearance permits use, but manufacturers must still make the protein work in specific drinks, dairy alternatives and sweets. Hua Mao’s account of different release curves explains why that task cannot be assumed. Bestzyme’s sensory and formulation services may help. The claimed reduction in development time still lacks disclosed customer evidence. Product performance will depend on the food matrix, blend and desired taste rather than sweetness intensity alone.

CONCLUSION

China’s National Health Commission has accepted Bestzyme’s application for a new food additive variety, according to Green Queen, but no approval is reported. The plant deserves attention as a serious manufacturing attempt, yet regulatory decisions, verified output and disclosed economics will determine whether it is more than well-automated capacity.