BioConsortia, Inc, innovator of microbial solutions for plant trait enhancement and yield improvement, has moved new products into the registration phase
BioConsortia has an R&D platform for the discovery of beneficial microbes and a development model to produce agricultural products with superior efficacy and higher consistency in three areas of research:
1) Biopesticides: A pipeline of several bio fungicides and nematicides with superior efficacy
2) Biostimulants: Growth promoting products that further increase yields in standard, high-yielding as well as stressed, agronomic conditions
3) Fertiliser use efficiency and nitrogen-fixation: Developing products for major non-leguminous row crops (such as corn and wheat)
BioConsortia has raised more than US$40mn from Khosla Ventures and Otter Capital to invest in its R&D platform and a team of 35 scientists to develop biologicals with superior efficacy and higher consistency. With these resources, BioConsortia has developed a pipeline of products that prove the power of its Advanced Microbial Selection (AMS) platform. BioConsortia is in the registration phase with a number of bio fungicide and biostimulant products and has a series of nematicide products that will be submitted for registration in 2020.
BioConsortia is pioneering the use of directed selection supported by microbiome analysis and machine learning to identify teams of microbes that improve plant performance, increase crop yields, and enhance and/or decrease the use of conventional pesticides and fertilisers. Once leads are identified BioConsortia uses a range of microbial R&D techniques, including tagging and root colonisation robustness to ensure its products are efficacious across a wide range of crop, soil and environmental conditions.
The products that are moving to registration have demonstrated efficacy in extensive field trials. BioConsortia has identified a remarkable number of bio fungicide leads that are numerically better in efficacy than the best bio fungicide products on the market today; two of which are entering the registration phase of development.
The biostimulants moving to registration have shown yield increases of more than 15 per cent in tomatoes, potatoes and green beans. Similarly, the nematicide products in early field trials have significantly decreased the number of nematodes infecting the crop plants and have increased yield by 15 per cent.
