Calyxt, Inc., a plant-based synthetic biology company, has signed an agreement with its first manufacturing partner, Evologic Technologies GmbH, to further develop and scale its proprietary Plant Cell Matrix (PCM) technology platform. The PCM structure is a living system of various cell types designed to emulate the intercellular metabolism of an entire plant as it grows over time, produces and stores or excretes target chemistries.
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According to Calyxt, Evologic's contract development and manufacturing services, based on its bioprocess platform and technology, support companies delivering unique sustainable bioproducts. Specifically, Evologic will advance both the manufacturing of PCM-derived compounds and establish proof of concept for the subsequent scaling of multiple PCMs simultaneously for commercial production.
"This agreement is an important milestone in our speed-to-scale acceleration that will position us to address the growing interest in plant-based solutions across our target markets of cosmeceuticals, nutraceuticals and pharmaceuticals," said Michael A. Carr, president and chief executive officer at Calyxt. "Evologic shares our commitment to scaled and economically feasible solutions that will enable the accelerated growth of sustainable ingredients that are often difficult to source and finite in nature..."
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"Since our founding, we have strongly supported the industry to turn science-based biological ingredients into economically feasible, industrial-scale products," said Wieland Reichelt, CEO and co-founder of Evologic Technologies. "Manufacturing is clearly the key for high product quality at reasonable costs even so for challenging plant-based sustainable products. Through this agreement with Calyxt, we are excited to engage in changing the status quo of manufacturing plant-based solutions."