About

Terra Bioindustries Inc. (Terra) is a groundbreaking agri-food-tech SME, which has developed a patent-pending decarbonizing process, which valorizes agro-industrial byproducts into multiple valuable and functional ingredients for food and bio-production applications. Terra’s first high-impact initiative is with Brewers’ Spent Grain (BSG). Terra transforms BSG into 3 ingredients: an insoluble protein concentrate (Protina), a dietary fiber both very suitable for baked goods (TerraFibra), and a barley malt syrup for fermentation and food applications (TerraMalt). Through this, Terra services the brewing, baking and sauce making sectors with TerraMalt, baked goods, snack bars, baking mixes and pet foods with Protina and TerraFibra.

Project

Terra envisions to develop an AI tool designed to query relevant regulatory databases and rapidly identify points of comparison or distinction from already approved ingredients and products. This approach informs Terra’s regulatory strategy, increasing the likelihood of successfully establishing non-novelty and reducing approval times. The new AI tool will evaluate the regulatory pathway for each novel ingredient—a critical step in bringing these innovations swiftly to market. In future iterations, the tool will be adaptable to query targeted regulatory authorities, depending on the regions where the ingredients are intended for consumption. With support from the Development and Commercialization program, Terra Bioindustries will scale up its laboratory process for enzyme-assisted ingredient extraction, develop comprehensive characterization and testing packages, and use process data to inform, refine prompt methodology, and help train the AI navigator (LLM tool) developed with the support of Vineland. This will streamline food regulatory compliance and help accelerate product development.

Impact & Outcomes

Though this project, Terra Bioindustries aims to develop an AI tool that will optimize food regulatory and compliance processes. Specifically, the tool is designed to search databases containing information on ingredients already approved by Health Canada and the FDA, identifying those most similar to Terra’s own ingredients, providing data used for approvals and labelling. This capability will significantly accelerate Terra’s identification of new sources for upcycled products, streamline development timelines, and enable a faster entry into new markets. With this increased speed to market, Terra expects to achieve $2 million in sales within 3 years and expand its team to 6 full-time employees.