DLG backs Danish insect protein startup business, Enorm closes funding round of €50m

27-Jan-2022 - Last updated on 27-Jan-2022 at 11:51 GMT

Related tags Enorm black soldier fly Denmark Insect meal

Danish insect protein startup, Enorm Biofactory, has closed a funding round of €50m (US$55.9m).

Among the new shareholders is DLG, one of Europe’s largest agribusiness companies. The startup said the funding round also includes loans from The Danish Green Investment Fund and Nykredit Bank.

“With our current suppliers and cooperation partners, and DLG as a shareholder, we have a strong foundation to develop Enorm to commercial scale,” said Carsten Lind Pedersen, CEO, Enorm Biofactory.

The closing of the funding round was a major milestone for the company to be able to go from pilot to industrial production. With a a strong team and permits in place, Enorm said it it set to expand its facility, located in Hedensted Municipality, Jutland, in central Denmark.

The new site is anticipated to be fully operational in the second half of 2023, with output of 100 tons of larval biomass per day, equivalent to around 11,000 tons of insect protein meal per year.

Management team

Enorm was established in 2017. Along with Pedersen as CEO, Jane L Sam, his daughter, is its COO while Arne Blok Lauridsen is its CTO. The company also has an additional 13 employees.

Production is based on the Black Soldier Fly (BSF). For the past three years, Enorm has been producing three tons of insect meal per week at its pilot scale facility. Its ingredients are targeted at feed for pigs, poultry, fish, and pets.

“The knowledge that we have built up establishing and running the pilot plant gives us the confidence to scale up the plant to commercial scale. We have developed the project in close cooperation with experienced technology suppliers such as the Danish producer of ventilation systems, SKOV A/S, and producer of logistic systems, Sealing System A/S,” said the CEO.

Feeding trials

Enorm has been running feeding trials on its insect meal at the National Institute of Aquatic Resources at the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) with the product, it added, showing promising protein digestibility data in trout and tilapia.

The COO told us the residual biomass for use as a rearing substrate for the BSF larvae comes from byproducts from local potato and dairy processing industries, among other food processing sources.