Bioamber: DNP Green Technology's Joint Venture with ARD
In order to accelerate the development and commercialization of its core technology, DNP Green Technology entered into a worldwide joint venture with Agro Industrie Recherches et Développements (ARD), a leading French R&D company that specializes in developing and scaling up fermentation and downstream purification processes.
ARD is owned by a large French agricultural group that includes Champagne Céréales, Chamtor and Cristal Union. The group has annual sales in excess of 3 billon euros. DNP selected ARD because it has pilot scale fermentation capacity and extensive experience in both process scale up and optimization. With large scale fermentation reactors at their disposal, ARD is an ideal partner for DNP to scale up its succinic acid technology. The joint venture with ARD, Bioamber, has advanced the succinic acid production process and scaled it up to 80,000 liters scale. While other succinic acid fermentation technologies exist, none have been scaled up, giving DNP a significant technological lead over the competition.
Bioamber is preparing further scale up of the technology by building a 2,000 metric ton per year industrial demonstration plant in Pomacle, France. This plant, which will be operational in late 2009, will be used to confirm the technical and commercial viability of bio-based succinic acid. In parallel, Bioamber is going to open up new markets for succinic acid and its derivatives and develop corresponding turn-key licensing packages that will be presented to chemical, starch and manufacturing companies for licensing beginning in 2011.