Biochemicals

by Debra Fiakas CFA This week the last reminder of the renewable fuels business that was once called Solazyme will be gone.  The old Solazyme has abandoned the goal of producing renewable fuels using the oils from algae.  Instead, under a new name TerraVia, the company is directing its algae cultivation and harvesting knowhow toward growing edible algae for food and personal care products.  To make the change complete the old stock symbol ‘SYZM’ gives way this week to a new trading symbol ‘TVIA.’ No doubt there is more than just a little hope in Terra...

Jim Lane Zombies with attitude. New partnerships for making magic molecules and exploitin’ the heck out of ’em. These days, nothing in Hollywood beats a great zombie movie, more than 50 have been released in recent years. Zombies rise from the dead, and change everything around them. It’s not always pretty, or predictable, but they’re a disruptive force. Well, Amyris (AMRS) is proving to be a zombie story these days starting with being labeled a “zombie company” by The Motley Fool. TMF writes: Amyris was a pioneering industrial biotech that went from darling of the field to a company now trading well...

Industrial bio-chemical developer Amyris, Inc. (AMRS:  Nasdaq) has been in the headlines recently  -  some pointing to solid fundamental progress, others ‘not so much.’  Amyris recently announced a new relationship with Givaudan (GIVN: VX), a supplier of active ingredients for cosmetics.  The two have agreed to collaborate in research and development on proprietary fragrances.  Earlier this month Amyris announced the launch by Takasago International Corporation (TYO:  4914) of a new fragrance created with Amyris’ technology. Cosmetics and fragrances present large market opportunities and the strength of demand for personal care products supports strong profit margins.  The relationships are likely...

Jim Lane What makes Amyris (AMRS), Amyris? We look at the products, the evolution of the story, the partners, the focus on yield, and deeper into the story of Rate. “I mean, man, whither goest thou? Whither goest thou, America, in thy shiny car in the night?” “Whither goest thou?” echoed Dean with his mouth open. We sat and didn’t know what to say; there was nothing to talk about any more. The only thing to do was go.” Jack Kerouac, On the Road Amyris experienced last month what CEO John Melo referred to as “our...

Jim Lane Like to quickly understand the surge in renewable chemicals and one of the hottest companies in the hottest sector of the bioconomy? Here’s our 10-minute version of the IPO from Elevance Renewable Sciences. Complete with the risks, translated into English from the original SEC-speak. In Illinois, Elevance Renewable Sciences filed its S-1 registration statement relating to a proposed $100 million initial public offering. The number of shares to be offered and the price range for the offering have not yet been determined. The company indicated that it has apply to list the stock on NASDAQ under the ERSI symbol. The...

Jim Lane In California and Canada this week, BioAmber (BIOA), Pacific Ethanol (PEIX) and the former Solazyme (SZYM) reported their Q4 and year-end results, providing between them a fascinating look at the evolution in the fuels, renewable chemicals, specialty products and nutrition that make up the advanced bioeconomy. In advanced nutrition The most spectacular news of the week belonged to TerraVia (formerly SolaZyme), which landed a 5-year, $200 million “baseload” offtake deal with Unilever, which provides a huge lift for investors and validates the economics and performance of the company’s first commercial plant, which it operates in a...

Jim Lane Back in September 2015, we reported that Amyris inked a multi-year agreement with the US Defense Advance Research Projects Agency, the famed DARPA that gave us everything from kevlar to the Global Positioning System and the Internet the goal in this $35M agreement with the Biological Technologies Office was to create new research and development tools and technologies compressing the time to market for any new molecule by at least 10-fold in both time and cost. The story expanded this week when we heard from Amyris (AMRS) that it had completed strain engineering and...

Jim Lane The Coca-Cola Company invests in Gevo, Virent and Avantium partnerships, in the race to develop renewable plastic bottling entirely from renewables. There’s been an awful lot of press this week about progress in the search for the God particle. That’s the subatomic Higgs Boson a key, but as yet undetected, anchor in the standard model of the universe. Then there’s the Jesus molecule. As in, “Kind lord Jesus in Heaven, grant me an affordable way to make one of those.” It’s renewable PX, also known as your friend, paraxylene a key, but as...

Jim Lane  In France, Avantium completed its highly-anticipated initial public offering, raising $109.5M (€103M) via the sale of 9,401,793 shares at $11.70 (€11) per share, giving the company a market capitalization reaches of $294M (€277M). Trading will begin on March 15th 2017 on Euronext Amsterdam and Euronext Bruxelles under the symbol AVTX. The Company anticipates to use €65-75 million of the net proceeds of the Offering for the funding of the Joint Venture, enabling it to construct and operate the reference plant for the commercialization of the YXY technology. The company’s first world-scale plant is a 50,000 tons...

by Debra Fiakas CFA Since the end of August last year shares of renewable chemicals developer Amyris (AMRS:  Nasdaq) have been in a steady decline.  Since falling through a line of price support near the $2.50 price level in early December 2014, it appears there is no safety net for AMRS.  The stock set a new 52-week low in the third week in January 2015.  Unfortunately, a popular technical indicator, the average directional index, is providing a very strong indication that the stock could fall even further.   With its stock chart providing no hints at a reversal in...

Jim Lane Word arrived from Minnesota that BioAmber has signed a 210,000 ton per year take-or-pay contract for bio-based succinic acid with Vinmar International. Explaining why BioAmber (BIOA) stock shot up nearly 17% in today’s trading despite a global equities pullback that affected almost everyone else in industrial biotech. Under the terms of the 15-year agreement, Vinmar has committed to purchase and BioAmber Sarnia has committed to sell 10,000 tons of succinic acid per year from the 30,000 ton per year capacity plant that is currently under construction in Sarnia, Canada. Bottom line, BioAmber continues to roll and roll....

Comet, BioAmber in big cellulosic sugar partnership Jim Lane In Ontario, Comet Biorefining has signed an off-take agreement with bio-succinic acid producer BioAmber (BIOA) for cellulosic dextrose from Comet’s upcoming first commercial plant in Sarnia, Ontario. The dextrose will be produced from agricultural residues using Comet’s innovative technology. The agreement also provides increasing shape to the development of an biobased industrial cluster in the Sarnia region of Ontario a corn-growing region where farmers will provide agricultural residues which will be processed into industrial-grade cellulosic dextrose by Comet. In turn, BioAmber will be the offtake partner for those...

Jim Lane In California, Amyris (AMRS) has a new partner, described fetchingly yet with near-to-complete vagueness as a “a leader in food ingredients and nutraceuticals” which is roughly as helpful as describing a person as “someone who enjoys ice cream”. Some ice cream there is, nevertheless, in this agreement, which will bring a short-term collaboration investment of $10 million, an equity investment of up to $20 million at $1.40 per share, and $100 million in annual revenue starting in 2017 connected to the production and cost improvement of fermentation molecules. One thing, and the only one, we discover...

Jim Lane Raises $80M at $10 per share; becomes first new industrial biotech company to complete IPO in more than a year. What went right and how? Is the IPO window re-opening? In Minnesota, BioAmber announced the pricing of its initial public offering of 8 million units consisting of one share of common stock and one warrant to purchase half of one share of common stock at $10 per unit, before underwriting discounts and commissions. All units are being sold. BioAmber has granted the underwriters an option for 30 days to purchase up to an additional 1.2 million...

Jim Lane In Canada, Mitsui has invested an additional CDN$25 million in the BioAmber (BIOA) joint venture for 10% of the equity, increasing its stake from 30% to 40%. Mitsui will also play a stronger role in the commercialization of bio-succinic acid produced in Sarnia, providing dedicated resources alongside BioAmber’s commercial team. BioAmber will maintain a 60% controlling stake in the joint venture. “Mitsui is continuously committed to renewable chemistry and through our increased equity stake we will be more actively involved in joint venture management and sales, leveraging our global sales platforms,” said Hidebumi Kasuga, General Manager, Specialty...

Jim Lane IIn California, American Refining Group has committed to a 33.3% equity investment into Novvi , a joint venture of Amyris (AMRS) and Cosan (CZZ). Both Amyris and Cosan will continue to hold share ownership stakes in Novvi, together with ARG. It’s not a tiny market by any means. The global markets for base oils and lubricants, are expected to reach $42 billion and $70 billion in size, respectively, by 2020, according to Amyris. For ARG: Why Novvi, why now? Think novel performance. It goes in two directions. First, there’s low-carbon performance customers want...