Pro Farm adds Marrone Bio with nutrient and biostimulant technology and products for seed and foliar treatments
Image: Marrone Bio has completed acquisition of Pro Farm Technologies. Photo: courtesy of Tumisu from Pixabay.
Marrone Bio Innovations has completed the acquisition of Finland-based Pro Farm Technologies for an enterprise value of $31.8m (£25.5m).
Under the deal, Pro Farm’s equity holders, debt holders and advisors are provided with a combination of $6.2m (£4.9m) cash and 12.7 million shares of Marrone Bio stock.
The deal also includes potential payment of up to $7.5m (£6.02m) of additional shares of stock deliverable from 2021 through 2024 based on the achievement of agreed commercial milestones.
The acquisition of Pro Farm will add Marrone Bio with advanced nutrient and biostimulant technology and products for seed and foliar treatments.
Pro Farm’s advanced technology for seed and foliar treatments
Pro Farm’s technology deploys a new mode of action for the stimulation of plant growth and improves plant health.
The technology is suitable for seed and foliar treatments in the major row and speciality crops of corn, cereals, sunflowers, oilseed rape (canola), sugar beets and vegetables.
Recently, Pro Farm and Corteva Agriscience have entered into a strategic and long-term exclusive commercial agreement in Europe for the development and commercialisation of a suite of seed-applied biological products based on Pro Farm’s technology platform.
In Europe, Corteva Agriscience will introduce the first corn, sunflower and oilseed rape products based on Pro Farm’s biological platform in the 2020/2021 season, with a target treatment coverage of over 10 million hectares.
Marrone Bio Innovations CEO Pam Marrone said: “I am pleased to announce the completion of our strategic acquisition of Pro Farm, which not only provides Marrone Bio with an exciting, complementary technology, but with an expanded global distribution network for our entire product portfolio as well.
“The addition of Pro Farm to our platform is expected to be accretive to net income and cash flow from operations in 2020. We look forward to further leveraging our technology and products across all three fast growing biologicals categories of bioprotection, biostimulants and bionutrition.”