Company buys 50% joint venture interest previously owned by Intrexon Corp.
Darling Ingredients Inc. has acquired the 50% joint venture interest of EnviroFlight LLC owned by Intrexon Corp., thereby increasing its ownership interest in EnviroFlight to 100%.
EnviroFlight produces black soldier fly (BSF) larvae using proprietary technology. The company aims to significantly expand production of advanced ingredients for sustainable feed and nutrition derived from BSF larvae through the largest commercial-scale BSF larvae production facility in the United States, which opened in December 2018 in Maysville, Kentucky.
EnviroFlight’s insect-based approach offers significant potential to convert nutrients from abundant food surpluses and renewable energy co-products into valuable proteins, oils and fertilizers. Additionally, from an ecological perspective, it also allows for decreasing dependence on non-sustainable protein sources for animal feed. Within the fish and poultry markets, BSF larvae also represent a more typical diet for these natural insectivores as compared with soy and other plant-based meals, making them an ideal candidate for nutritive feed ingredients.
“Expanding our ownership of EnviroFlight empowers us to accelerate our ability to create higher value, sustainable specialty proteins for the agriculture and companion animal feed industries,” said Randall C. Stuewe, chairman and CEO of Darling Ingredients, in a press release. “Our purpose is to repurpose, and growing insects for specialty feed ingredients yields 10 times the usable protein per acre compared to producing algae and is at least 50 times the protein per acre compared to soy.”
Darling Ingredients is a global developer and producer of sustainable natural ingredients from edible and inedible bio-nutrients, creating a wide range of ingredients and customized specialty solutions for customers in the pharmaceutical, food, pet food, feed, industrial, fuel, bioenergy, and fertilizer industries. In November, the company reported net sales of $842.0 million for the third quarter of 2019, as compared with net sales of $812.6 million for the third quarter of 2018.
Since late 2014, EnviroFlight has collaborated with Darling Ingredients to refine its scalable production processes for BSF larvae. Darling acquired a 50% ownership interest in EnviroFlight in 2016.
EnviroFlight did not respond to Feed Strategy’s request for comment on the deal.
