How a Bengaluru company turns fruit waste into everyday product ingredients

BacAlt Biosciences Private Limited, a Bengaluru-based company founded in 2023, is turning fruit waste into everyday product ingredients. The company's founders, Shruti Kutmutia and Pranav Nair, are biotechnologists with expertise in microbiology and biopolymer fermentation. BacAlt works from Electronics City and sells to other businesses, not directly to consumers.

The company's process begins with agricultural residue and agro-industrial fruit waste. These materials are fermented into two biopolymers: bacterial cellulose and poly-gamma glutamic acid. Bacterial cellulose is produced by microbes, while poly-gamma glutamic acid is a thickener and moisture-holding agent. Utilizing waste as feedstock helps keep input costs low and provides an alternative use for crop residue, preventing it from being burned.

BacAlt's cost advantage lies in its non-sterile fermentation process, which runs alongside high-throughput methods and waste feedstock. This approach leads to multi-fold cost reductions compared to existing biopolymers at scale. The company's flagship product, ReRaw, is a blend of these two polymers. ReRaw can replace up to five synthetic additives with a single biodegradable ingredient, according to the company.

It claims to achieve significant cost reductions while offering a more environmentally friendly alternative to petrochemical-based polymers.

BacAlt's products have a wide range of applications across personal care, oral care, and home care industries. They also target agrochemicals, nutraceuticals, pharmaceuticals, textiles, and wound care markets. CEO Kutmutia emphasizes that recyclable packaging alone is not enough to address the microplastic problem. Instead, the formulations within products are the primary source of microplastics. The company's ambition is to move India from importing specialty ingredients to exporting them.