MONTREAL — Lallemand Inc. (through its Swiss affiliate, Danstar Ferment AG) completed an equity investment in Livzym Biotechnologies as part of a strategic collaboration within industrial enzymes.

Livzym has over the last nine years developed a range of enzymes for mainly food and animal feed applications based on their fungi-based technology platform. They recently commissioned an enzyme plant in Tuzla near Istanbul, Turkey, that provides enzyme production capabilities.

The Lallemand investment in Livzym, alongside equity raised from Turkish investors, will contribute to financing the expansion of the Tuzla plant to meet the growing demand for enzymes. As part of the strategic collaboration, Lallemand will market and distribute Livzym enzymes to customers worldwide and will involve cooperation around the development and production of the enzymes in Turkey.

“We are committed to making biotechnology one of the answers to the challenges the world faces with respect to nutrition, health and the environment,” said Lars Asferg, president of Lallemand Bio-Ingredients. “Lallemand is a major global producer of yeast and entered in 2019 the baking enzyme market with our proprietary ‘LallZyme’ range based on our yeast technology. We have since expanded our enzyme presence with acquisitions of the BASF ‘Nutrilife’ food and ‘Spartec’ bio-fuel enzymes businesses. The strategic collaboration with Livzym and their fungal development and production platform perfectly complements our position within the enzymes sector. The inclusion of Livzym’s enzymes within Lallemand’s portfolio will enable us to provide our customers with an exciting range of high-performance enzymes.”

The partnership will help advance enzyme and alternative protein technologies.

“The future of food and agriculture is vital for global sustainability, with biotechnology playing a key role in transforming production technologies,” said Dr. Serdar Uysal, founder and chief executive officer of Livzym. “Livzym is the first industrial enzyme producer to be based in Turkey enabling us to service customers across the Europe, Asia, Middle East and African regions. We are very excited about our strategic investment partnership with Lallemand, a leading global fermentation company, seeing it as a significant opportunity to advance sustainability and enzyme and alternative protein technologies through our precision fermentation capabilities.”