Danone opens 5,200-square-metre nutrition research centre in Shanghai
The centre includes a 900-square-metre OneBiome laboratory, a pilot-production facility covering 700 square metres and a 300-square-metre space for science demonstrations and customer engagement. It houses Danone’s third OneBiome laboratory, following facilities established in France and Singapore in 2025. The French laboratory, in the Paris-Saclay innovation cluster, opened in October that year. Danone’s research centre in Utrecht, in the Netherlands, also contributes to the group’s work on specialised nutrition and the microbiome. Taous Lassel, Danone’s vice-president responsible for research and innovation in Asia-Pacific and China, as well as global research digitalisation and artificial intelligence, described China and the wider Asian region as important markets for early-life and medical nutrition, dairy and plant-based products. She said the company wanted to work within China’s scientific ecosystem to accelerate innovation alongside its existing regional teams.
Research at the Shanghai laboratory will examine gut bacteria and the relationships between different organisms within the microbiome. Isabelle Esser, Danone’s chief human resources, research and innovation, quality and food safety officer, highlighted China’s capabilities in genomics and bacterial sequencing. Connecting that expertise with research in Paris, Utrecht and Singapore would allow Danone to draw on its international scientific network, she said. Although the company has worked on biotics and digestive health for many years, Esser described substantial changes in the tools available to researchers. She said developments over the past 10–15 years in sequencing, genomics, metabolomics and artificial intelligence had made much larger datasets accessible. According to Esser, sequencing work that previously required ten years could now take days or even minutes.
One research priority is the relationship between gut microorganisms and biological markers associated with ageing. Esser said Danone wanted to deepen its work on longevity, quality of life and healthspan—the years a person spends in good health. Equipment at the Shanghai laboratory includes technology for scanning muscles throughout the body, allowing researchers to examine how nutritional interventions affect muscle quality as people age. Esser said those measurements could inform products combining biotics with protein and amino acids to support healthy muscle. Lassel said analysing muscle measurements alongside information about brain and intestinal activity allowed specialists from different disciplines to work together and accelerate development processes that had previously proceeded sequentially. China provides a market for this research in which more than 20% of the population is over 60. Esser said interest had shifted from simply extending life towards preserving independence, participation in community life and the ability to pursue enjoyable activities.
Esser linked the company’s healthy-ageing research to renewed attention to food’s effects on both immediate and long-term health. She identified protein consumption, insufficient fibre intake and the use of GLP-1 medicines for weight management as parts of that broader trend. The source describes rising use of GLP-1 receptor agonists during 2026, including the introduction of oral formulations. The United States remained the largest market. According to Gallup research cited in the article, 11% of American adults were using the medicines for weight management by the middle of 2026. Users can lose muscle as well as fat, creating opportunities for protein-product development. Danone is also examining the implications for digestive health. Esser described these areas as connected elements of the company’s work on nutrition and health, rather than separate product-development disciplines.
Danone acquired Belgium’s The Akkermansia Company in 2025. The business developed the proprietary biotic strain Akkermansia muciniphila MucT, which Esser connected to Danone’s research on preserving muscle during weight management. She said the strain could help maintain muscle in people receiving GLP-1 treatment or otherwise seeking to manage their weight, citing clinical evidence published in Nature. Esser also stressed that the company’s development work concerned how the organism was used to influence the wider gut microbiome and support muscle protection. Products incorporating that research were among those Danone wanted to introduce. Her comments placed the acquisition within the company’s broader work combining biotics, muscle health and nutritional interventions for consumers whose dietary needs change during weight loss or ageing.
The Shanghai investment builds on Danone’s existing research activities in China. Since 2020, the company has produced 56 scientific papers, submitted 27 patent applications and undertaken almost 30 studies locally. The new centre is intended to connect expertise from universities, healthcare organisations and innovation partners, with the aim of responding more quickly to changing nutritional and health needs in China and elsewhere in Asia-Pacific. Lassel said access to the country’s scientific community was an important reason for locating the operation there. The company plans to use the centre’s combination of research disciplines and development facilities to support work across its specialised nutrition categories, while linking local researchers with colleagues in other countries.
The centre’s capabilities extend from initial research to industrialisation. Danone intends to use that range to adapt international scientific work to Chinese nutritional requirements and to share innovations developed in China across its worldwide research network. Lassel highlighted exchanges with academic collaborators and suppliers as part of the centre’s role in nutrition and microbiome research. She said the Shanghai teams would work closely with colleagues abroad while developing their relationships within China. The facility’s pilot plant forms part of that research-to-production infrastructure, alongside its laboratory and customer-engagement spaces.
