Ingredion Inc. (NYSE: INGR) and Shiru announced a global research and development collaboration to accelerate the discovery and commercialization of functional proteins for food, beverage, supplements and specialized nutrition markets.

The partnership combines Shiru's artificial intelligence discovery platform with Ingredion's formulation expertise and manufacturing scale. Shiru's platform contains more than 77 million natural protein sequences that have been catalogued and analyzed.

The collaboration will focus on developing prebiotics derived from natural sources to promote healthier microbiomes. The companies said AI-driven protein discovery creates new possibilities that conventional research and development cannot easily access.

"We have broken the mold on how ingredient discovery is done," said Dr. Jasmin Hume, founder and CEO of Shiru. "What once took a team of 50 scientists a decade and a healthy dose of serendipity, we can now do strategically and efficiently in months."

Ingredients developed through the joint research will have access to Ingredion's customer base of more than 18,000 companies across 120 countries.

"Shiru helps us discover better natural ingredients more quickly so we can help our customers deliver new products at a pace the market expects," said Michael Leonard, chief innovation officer at Ingredion.

Shiru previously launched two AI-discovered ingredients, uPro and OleoPro, for use in food and personal care products. The Berkeley, California-based company was named a TIME Best Invention of 2024.

Ingredion, headquartered in the Chicago suburbs, reported 2025 annual net sales of approximately $7.2 billion and employs more than 11,000 people globally.