There was a mid sized scam by a company praising algae as the future in Germany a few years ago.The company claimed that they would soon produce huge quantities of algae for nutrition, cosmetics, fuel, etc.. They collected money from private investors (which how they did it was illegal), but they had nothing but a small prototype that did not even work well, is was all smoke an mirrors. A very nice but gullible friend of mine lost about 5000€ in that.

Since then I am VERY sceptical about articles praising algae as the next big thing.