HEERLEN, THE NETHERLANDS — Royal DSM N.V. has acquired certain assets, licenses and other agreements in the areas of food enzymes and oilseed processing from Verenium, Heerlen-based DSM said March 26. DSM paid $37 million, which included transaction and related expenses.
The acquisition includes Verenium’s oilseed processing business and IP portfolio, licenses for certain food enzymes and access to biodiversity libraries that Verenium will create using proprietary technology. The 2012 sales of the businesses are estimated at about $15 million.
DSM acquired exclusive worldwide licenses to alpha-amylase and xylanase enzymes within the food and beverage markets from San Diego-based Verenium. DSM will have access to the bio-diversity collection and library that Verenium is creating. By extracting microbial DNA from collected samples, the task of culturing individual microbes in a laboratory is avoided. Using screening technologies, Verenium mines its collection of billions of microbial genes in search of unique enzymes.
“This acquisition will broaden our enzymes business and fits very well in our strategy of continued value growth for our nutrition cluster,” said Stephen Tanda, a member of the DSM managing board and responsible for the nutrition cluster.
Other Verenium enzyme products minimize pollution by reducing or replacing chemicals used in industrial processes while enhancing yields in customers’ processes. Verenium developed Purifine PLC, an enzyme that offers crop-based oil producers a sustainable way to improve yields as well as overall processing economics.