GLOBAL BIOENERGIES

Their core work

Global Bioenergies is a French industrial biotechnology company specializing in converting renewable and waste biomass into drop-in biofuels and bio-based chemicals, with a core focus on bio-isobutene production through fermentation. They develop and scale up biological processes that transform feedstocks like wheat straw, soft wood residues, and sugars into hydrocarbons that can directly replace fossil-derived fuels and chemical building blocks. Their work spans the full value chain from feedstock preparation through biorefinery processing to end-product formulation, positioning them as a technology provider for the defossilization of the fuel and chemicals industries.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

Global Bioenergies' H2020 portfolio is concentrated in a tight 2017-2018 window, making temporal evolution difficult to distinguish sharply. Their initial entry (OPTISOCHEM, 2017) focused on converting agricultural waste (wheat straw) into bio-based chemicals, while subsequent projects broadened into wood-based biorefineries (REWOFUEL, SWEETWOODS) and more frontier approaches like electro-biological fuel production (eForFuel) and CO2 valorization (BioRECO2VER). The trajectory shows a clear expansion from single-feedstock bio-chemical production toward multi-feedstock, multi-product biorefinery platforms with increasing interest in power-to-fuel and carbon capture integration.

Moving beyond sugar/straw fermentation toward integrating renewable electricity and CO2 as feedstocks — signaling a pivot toward power-to-X and circular carbon technologies.

How they like to work

Global Bioenergies operates as both a project leader and a specialist technology contributor. They coordinated two of their largest projects (REWOFUEL at EUR 5.7M and OPTISOCHEM at EUR 4.4M), demonstrating willingness and capacity to lead major consortia, while also joining as a participant or third party where their fermentation and biorefinery expertise complements larger teams. With 46 unique partners across 15 countries, they maintain a broad European network rather than relying on a small circle of repeat collaborators — a sign of an organization that is well-connected and sought after in the bioeconomy community.

Extensive network of 46 partners spanning 15 countries, reflecting deep integration into the European bioeconomy research and industrial ecosystem. Their partnerships likely include both academic institutions for upstream research and industrial partners for scale-up and market deployment.

What sets them apart

Global Bioenergies is one of very few companies worldwide that has developed a direct biological route to produce isobutene — a platform molecule for fuels, plastics, and rubber — from renewable sources. This gives them a rare position at the intersection of industrial biotechnology and the fuel/chemical industry, where most competitors rely on chemical catalysis rather than fermentation. For consortium builders, they bring not just R&D capability but a proprietary technology platform that can be adapted to multiple feedstocks (straw, wood, CO2), making them a versatile and high-value industrial partner.

Highlights from their portfolio

• REWOFUEL
  Largest single grant at EUR 5.7M, coordinated by Global Bioenergies, targeting the conversion of residual soft wood into drop-in gasoline and jet biofuels — a direct fossil fuel replacement pathway.
• OPTISOCHEM
  First coordinated H2020 project (EUR 4.4M), demonstrating their core wheat-straw-to-bio-isobutene technology at demonstration scale for bio-based chemicals.
• eForFuel
  Represents their most forward-looking work: converting renewable electricity into liquid hydrocarbons via electrochemistry and synthetic metabolism — a power-to-fuel concept with major future potential.