New Italian-Swedish biotech network promotes probiotics
The network will be made up of Italian dairy enzyme producer Caglificio Clerici, Swedish dairy ingredients firm Kemikalia partially acquired by Caglificio Clerici in 2006, Italian biotech company Sacco and Italian probiotic supplier CSL (the Centro Sperimentale del Latte/Experimental Dairy Centre) acquired by Sacco in 2013.
The network is putting particular emphasis on harmonising communication and manufacturing practices, CSL general manager Marco Caspani told us.
“It’s a network of companies with common marketing communication strategies. We’re from four industries in the same system, so it makes a lot of sense,” he said.
Part of this shared strategy will be the search for new partnerships and access into new markets like the US and South East Asia, he said but declined to give further details.
For CSL this meant greater focus on food supplement and pharmaceutical probiotics.
“Our core has always been dairy and food, now we’re going more into probiotics.”
He said this would be in addition to not as a shift from its dairy contract manufacturing.
The Sacco System network will also be conducting research into best manufacturing practices around growing mediums, strain stability and colony counting.
“Stability is one of the biggest challenges we’ve been following. I think it’s not true when someone says the opposite,” he said, citing heat and humidity sensitivity of all probiotic strains.
Around 20-30% of employees across the four companies work in the labs, Caspani said, showing how significant R&D is for them.
