Foods for nutritional disorders

Venture capital investment into food technology increased by a factor of 40 between 2011 and 2021, according to recently published figures.

Innovation opportunities in food are growing, with opportunities to develop a raft of new products serving a wide range of market segments, including the healthcare sector. Our client, a leading producer of frozen foods in Europe, had several successful meal products for customers in the healthcare and care home markets.

However, some of their customers’ patients suffered from medical conditions—such as dysphagia and nutritional disorders—that made eating conventionally-prepared meals difficult. Previously, our client had tried to accommodate patients’ needs by developing meals intended to better serve people with nutritional disorders. But its efforts were unsuccessful.

Our client’s R&D team lacked a detailed understanding of the ways that specific nutritional disorders cause difficulties for patients. Furthermore, investigating all innovative food processing technologies was a challenging task for the company’s internal team. As such, our client recognised they needed expert help getting actionable advice on new meals to better serve patients with specific nutritional and clinical needs.

We provided actionable takeaways in a final report and workshop session. Our analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of innovative food processing technologies provided a straightforward way to determine the most suitable technologies to invest in. Additionally, our comprehensive assessment provided direction for their future research and development work on this challenge. Our research and guidance ensured new products will more effectively accommodate patients with nutritional disorders.