By Allan Maurer
ALACHUA, FL – Pasteuria Bioscience has grabbed an additional $2.8 million of an $8.1 million B round to help commercialize its first product aimed at controlling nematodes that threaten golf courses throughout the Southeast.
The funding came from existing investors, Advantage Capital Florida Partners, Florida Gulfshore Capital, and Life Science Partners.
In 2003, the company raised $750,000 investment came from Tampa-based Advantage Capital Florida Partners and Gordon River Capital of Naples. In 2007 it closed on $ 5.3 million of this series B financing round led by LSP BioVentures.
CEO David Duncan tells TechJournal South the 13 employee company is in the process of raising a C round targeted at about $8 million.
If that raise is successful, he says, the company will be hiring additional scientific staff such as microbiology and fermintation specialists.
Founded in 2003 in the University of Florida’s Sid Martin Biotechnology Incubator, the company was developed out of Entomos Inc. to commercialize its revolutionary technology for production of nematode control products.
Duncan says it has grown from one to four labs in the incubator and is close to graduating from the facility.
Sting nematodes represent a major threat for golf courses throughout Florida and the Southeast. Additionally, the Society of Nematology and other organizations estimate global crop losses due to nematodes at $100 billion annually making it agriculture’s largest unmet pest control need.
Duncan says, “No crop on the globe is unaffected.” He says the problem is widespread among Southeast golf courses, “Particularly in the sandy coastal areas from Texas up through the Carolinas and further north. It’s a very bad problem that is getting worse.”
The company’s product, Pasteuria spp., first discovered 50 years ago, is an effective agent for nematode control, but until recently, the company says, no one could make it cost effectively for commercial use.
Pasteuria Bioscience says it has developed a revolutionary new technology that allows the rapid and cost-effective growth of multiple strains of Pasteuria manufactured through traditional fermentation methods.
Duncan says the company plans to launch its first product in early 2010 as proof of concept and is seeking a commercialization partner. “We’re making really good progress on that with some of the big Ag-biotech and Ag-chem companies and some smaller ones,” he says.
Duncan notes that the company’s technology is a platform applicable to a much larger market. It has a robust product pipeline targeting the most damaging nematode species in a wide variety of agricultural crops.
Products for nematode control in agronomic crops such as soybean and cotton, and in specialty crops such as strawberry and banana will be introduced as new brands or be commercialized through joint product development efforts with other agricultural companies.
Online: www.pasteuriabio.com
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