BRAIN AG's board agreed on a €60 million capital increase to boost the biotech company's "buy-and-build" strategy that includes acquiring suitable target companies as well as research and product development as it aims to become a fully integrated industrial company. The company announced advances in taste modulation understanding earlier this year.
A smaller share of the proceeds will serve to further advance BRAIN’s technology platforms, which the company says plays a crucial role in the NatLifE 2020 and ZeroCarb FP innovation alliances funded by the German Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF).
The BRAIN-led NatLifE 2020 alliance, adding up to a total of €30 million and bringing together 22 partners from industry and academia, is dedicated to the research on and the development of healthier food and cosmeceuticals.
BRAIN shareholders MP Beteiligungs-GmbH (Family Office PUTSCH) based in Kaiserslautern, Germany, as well as MIG Fonds, one of the largest institutional investors in the area of biotechnology, and several other investors are leading the largest ever round of financing in the area of white biotechnology. Brain qualified as a white biotechnology innovation leader in the two innovation alliances funded by the Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), NatLifE 2020 and ZeroCarb FP.
In the alliance managed by Brain's co-operation partner RWE Power AG (budget totals €46 million), ZeroCarb FP unites 21 partners from various industries which aim at reining in micro-organisms for the conversion of carbon-containing industrial waste flows into secondary raw materials.
“Thanks to the newly agreed-on financial resources, BRAIN will now be in a position to drive forward the company’s proven expansion strategy through further acquisitions and new joint ventures with industrial partners. Our aim is to develop an R&D-driven biotechnology company into a fully integrated industrial company," said Holger Zinke, BRAIN AG CEO.
