Innovative companies shared their experiences in glycoscience-based research and development:

• Chomarat - cellulose nanofribrils (Ardèche),
• Elicytil - production of oligosaccharides (Isère),
• Polymaris - production of exopolysaccharides of marine origin (Finistère),
• Inofib - production of cellulose microfibrils (Isère),
• SiaMed' Xpress - production of recombinant oligosaccharides specialized in glycosilation (Bouches-du-Rhône),
• Inbiose - production of oligosaccharides for infant nutrition (Belgium),
• Alganelle - production of therapeutic glycoproteins (Savoie).

These companies stressed that the success of glycoscience-based innovations depends on:

• Strong interaction with the world of research, greatly facilitated by the scientific careers of industrialists
• The need to participate in structuring collaborative projects
• The need for innovation in business models
• Industrial exploitation of a research-based technology

Companies are confronted with the traditional barriers encountered by innovative companies:

• Problems of financing innovation
• Some bio-sourced products do not perform as well as fossil carbon-based products. The challenge is to develop hybrid or high value-added products and not to substitute fossil carbon for biomass.
• Production costs often remain high
• Difficulties of industrial appropriation of technology (example of chromatogeny in the paper industry)
• In healthcare sector, regulatory validations are costly and time-consuming; this is an advantage for companies proposing solutions.
• Targets for reducing environmental impact are difficult to achieve

These companies have reported specific barriers to innovation in glycomics:

•  Lack of standards for sugars measurement
• Lack of structure in the glycomics sector (e. g. lack of databases of molecules and synthesis intermediates).

Glycosciences are part of the promise-based economy. Indeed, their objectives are to create bio-sourced and high-performance products in a context of reducing carbon footprint. But there are still a number of barriers to meet societal expectations.