Paris, March 30 2010 – Deinove, the world's leading specialist in the application of deinococci bacteria to biofuels, green chemistry and antibiotics, today announced the signature of a collaboration agreement with BENP Lillebonne, in partnership with Syral (both subsidiaries of the agro-industrial group Tereos, one of the world's key stakeholders in sugars, starches and alcohols).
The March 22 agreement covers the industrial validation of innovative processes developed by Deinove for the production of ethanol via fermentation of feed grain. Deinove will retain the worldwide rights to exploitation of its technologies and BENP Lillebonne will receive a license for industrial application. The goal is to achieve high-performance, cost-effective ethanol production.
The agreement forms part of the €21.4 million Deinol project, which has notably received €8.9 million in funding from the Strategic Industrial Innovation programme run by the French state innovation agency OSEO. As Project Leader, Deinove will receive €6 million in funding. The Deinol project's goal is to open up (by 2014) new pathways for lignocellulosic ("second-generation") ethanol production in existing industrial installations and without the need for massive additional investment.
"This major agreement demonstrates that the breakthrough technologies based on our 'bacterial cell factories' are rooted in industrial reality", emphasized Deinove CEO Jacques Biton. He added, "The perfect fit between Deinove and Tereos maximizes our chances of success, from R&D through to worldwide commercial operation".
"The deinococci appear to be capable of achieving significant productivity gains. In particular, the enzymatic properties of certain strains has prompted us to envisage exploitation of the hemicellulose and cellulose in fermentation wort and thus improve yields in cereal-based ethanol production. That would be an important milestone on the way to second-generation, 100% lignocellulosic production", commented Anne Wagner, Innovation Director at SYRAL.
"As one of the world's top bioethanol producers, our role is to verify and quantify the deinococci's performance levels The combination of Deinove's novel technologies with our own long-standing know-how is very promising", stated Bernard Chaud, Biofuel Projects Director at Tereos.
The biofuels market
Together, Brazil and the USA account for over 90% of the worldwide production of bioethanol, which rose from 18 billion litres per year in 2000 to 74 billion litres per year in 2009.
