Unique pet food platform: where innovation meets opportunity

As the pet food industry prepares for Fi Europe 2025 in Paris this December, the event addresses a long-standing challenge: turning breakthrough ingredients into pet food products that successfully reach store shelves.

Fi Europe’s Pet Food Suppliers Hub connects innovation across ingredients, packaging, processing and formulation with the decision-makers who can bring these solutions to market at scale. This approach addresses a clear gap in the market. The rapidly expanding European pet food sector, worth €29.3 billion ($31.9B), has created demand for a dedicated commercial platform that serves product developers, procurement professionals and general managers driving strategic decisions in pet nutrition.

Fi Europe’s Pet Food Suppliers Hub provides this European-based forum, designed specifically for the commercial professionals shaping the industry’s future.

The crossover advantage

Fi Europe sits at the crossroads of human and pet nutrition, creating opportunities for innovation to move in both directions. Novel ingredients often gain acceptance in human food first before appearing in pet food. The reverse is also true. Ingredients with limited human acceptance, like insects, are established in pet food. This back-and-forth between the two sectors highlights the unique role Fi Europe plays.

This two-way pipeline became clear at the 2024 Fi Europe Innovation Awards. Cargill’s TruPet™ postbiotic highlighted the growing trend in gut health across both human and pet nutrition, while Divaks’ textured insect protein showcased sustainable protein innovation that is gaining acceptance in pet food faster than in human food.

The commercial potential of this crossover is significant. Western Europe leads global pet food innovation, accounting for 38% of new product launches. The postbiotic pet food market, as shown by Cargill’s award-winning innovation, is projected to reach $1.3 billion (€1.1B) by 2030. The insect-based protein sector, demonstrated by Divaks’ textured solution, is expected to grow to $11.5 billion (€9.9B) by 2033.

Beyond the R&D department

What makes this crossover work is Fi Europe’s distinctive visitor profile. Beyond technical specialists, the event attracts decision-makers across the commercial spectrum. In 2024, procurement and purchasing professionals made up 14% of visitors, general management 13% and distribution 11%.

With a global visitor base, Fi Europe is technical enough to showcase genuine innovation, yet commercial enough to reach the people who can put it into practice.

The commercial relevance is reflected in the companies attending. While dedicated pet food manufacturers such as Nestlé Purina, Mars Petcare, Royal Canin and Wellness visit regularly, major F&B companies exploring pet food opportunities, including Unilever, General Mills and Colgate-Palmolive, also attend. This reflects the crossover potential that Fi Europe facilitates.

Building a complete pet food ecosystem

For 2025, Fi Europe is significantly expanding its offering for the pet industry. The Pet Food Suppliers Hub is growing its footprint and will host 30 exhibitors plus 15 product display pods. The main show floor already features hundreds of suppliers serving both the F&B and pet food industries, but the dedicated hub highlights the sector’s rising importance.

The enhanced program includes dedicated Pet Food Innovation Days, a Networking Program on 3 December, and a Pet Food Spotlight on 4 December featuring curated content covering market data, consumer trends and regulatory updates.

This comprehensive approach shows that modern pet food innovation extends far beyond ingredients. It encompasses processing solutions that maintain nutritional integrity, packaging innovations that extend shelf life and improve convenience, and formulation expertise that balances multiple functional requirements.

Market intelligence advantage

Last year, more than 450 exhibitors were active in pet food, from ingredients and additives to processing, packaging and consulting. This breadth enables comprehensive sourcing at the early stage of the supply chain, addressing commodity and high-volume considerations across all aspects of pet food development.

Beyond supplier connections, Fi Europe also delivers market intelligence that informs strategic decision-making. The 2025 content program will cover sustainable ingredient sourcing, innovation in pet food packaging, novel proteins and consumer trend reports. These sessions highlight the commercial context vital for procurement, distribution and management.

Sustainability themes dominated discussions at Fi Europe 2024’s content sessions, with strong interest from the pet food sector, indicating clear demand for knowledge and guidance on accelerating the industry’s sustainable progress.

The supplier base is responding to this evolution as well. Dedicated pet food exhibitors have been slower to seize the opportunity, but the more generic suppliers are returning in strength. Many now recognize that pet food is no longer just a side business. For a growing number of companies, it has become a significant revenue stream worthy of dedicated attention and investment.

The platform effect

The combination of crossover innovation, a broad commercial audience, a complete supplier ecosystem and strategic market intelligence creates what can be described as a platform effect. With Western Europe leading global pet food innovation and the industry’s growing focus on health, sustainability and premium positioning, there is rising demand for platforms that can turn breakthroughs into market successes.

Fi Europe’s comprehensive approach meets this need and creates the conditions where innovation can connect with the complete decision-making chain required for successful market implementation. In an industry where innovation drives differentiation and growth, Fi Europe’s role as a bridge between breakthrough solutions and market reality stands out.

The combination of innovation showcase and access to the full decision-making chain is what turns laboratory breakthroughs into products that reach pet owners. This ability to transform concepts into commercial reality represents Fi Europe’s core value proposition and explains why the platform is attracting growing attention from across the pet food industry’s innovation and commercial communities.