Fumaric acid production by fungal fermentation from renewable resources has received much attention, but suffers from low productivity and yield largely because of poor cell morphology limiting mass transfer. In this study, a simple seed culture medium was developed with soybean meal hydrolysate (SMH) as the nitrogen source for controlling the morphology of Rhizopus oryzae ATCC 20344. With the optimal seed culture conditions (pH 3.0, SMH concentration: 30% (v/v), and inoculation spore concentration: 8 x 10(7)/L uniformly dispersed mycelial clumps with a diameter of similar to 0.1 mm were formed, which gave high fumaric acid production from glucose in shake flasks, reaching a fumaric acid titer of 50.2 g/L and yield of 0.72 g/g glucose. Compared to the fermentation with cell pellets, the fermentation with mycelial clumps generated with SMH as nitrogen source increased fumaric acid production because of improved mass transfer. This process can lower the cost for bio-based fumaric acid and provide a novel way of using soybean meal besides its current use as animal feed supplement. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.