OVERLAND PARK, KAN. and BOULDER, COLO. — Hill’s Pet Nutrition is accelerating the development of more sustainable pet food proteins thanks to its partnership with Bond Pet Foods, a biotechnology company that uses fermentation technology to create biologically identical animal-free protein ingredients in real meat.
As the latest development in their partnership, the two companies announced on Feb. 5 Bond Pet Foods has officially shipped the first 2 tons of fermented animal protein to Hill’s Pet Nutrition Center in Topeka, Kan., where the protein will be used to formulate a trial. diets for regulation and market analysis.
“Production tonnage at the 45,000-liter scale is a major milestone in the Bond-Hill partnership,” said Rich Kelleman, founder and chief executive officer of Bond Pet Foods. “Furthermore, Hill’s commitment to expand our work together demonstrates the opportunity we collectively see in Bond ingredients for their future in the food and pet industries.”
The data obtained from Hill’s pet food trial will continue to serve as a baseline for future prototypes to gauge market acceptance. The diets will also be offered for review by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Center for Veterinary Medicine (CVM) to ensure regulatory compliance and safety, setting the stage for the development of more sustainable pet food proteins. animal forward.
The precision fermentation process used to create Bond Pet Foods ingredients is based on an old method used to make a range of products from enzymes to cheese to vitamin B12, according to the company. Bond took this process and refined it to produce traditional animal proteins — such as chicken, turkey and beef — without the need to raise, slaughter or process farm animals.
According to research published in PLoS One, dogs and cats account for up to 30% of the carbon dioxide emissions that come from domestic meat consumption. Through partnerships like the one between Hill’s Pet Nutrition and Bond Pet Foods, the concept of scalable, sustainable pet food proteins is now becoming a reality.
“Hill’s is known for its leadership in precise, complete-and-balanced, science-based nutrition,” said Dave Baloga, executive vice president of science and technology at Hill’s Pet Nutrition. “We are excited to continue our relationship with Bond and support their truly novel approach to produce animal proteins in a more sustainable way that meets our high quality standards.”
Additionally, the companies also signed a second Joint Development Agreement to build on their existing collaboration first announced in 2021. This second agreement calls for the development of another animal protein to be used in pet food products of Hill.
Read more about product development, ingredients and formulation.
