The latest feed updates from around the world

Adisseo announces new fund

Seventure Partners, one of Europe’s leaders in financing innovation and a world-leader in Life science microbiome investment, announces that it has launched AVF, the innovative venture capital fund, targeted at supporting companies in the field of animal health, feed and nutrition. The first close of AVF at € 24m, is corner stoned by animal nutrition company Adisseo. At a global level, AVF’s investment strategy focuses on two segments at the forefront of the modern agricultural and livestock revolution: animal health, feed and nutrition and digital technologies serving the livestock industry. Within the animal health sector, food digestibility, its nutritional value and energy potential, and the traceability of the entire animal food chain are major opportunities, as well as addressing the challenges around limiting the environmental footprint of the industry. In addition to the animal health and nutrition sector, the digital agricultural technology field has seen exponential growth, partly driven by climate change and scarcity in resources and biodiversity, as well as heightened pressure from increasingly demanding consumers. AVF will also finance digital innovations applied to the livestock value chain, such as smart breeding and diagnosis, control and traceability tools. AVF will primarily invest in innovative companies in Europe, North America and Israel, but will also be open to strong investment proposals from other geographies, including Asia.

Animine launches TEAM

At a recent distributors meeting, animal nutrition company Animine introduced TEAM: Team of Experts in Animal Management. The objective of the TEAM is to reinforce the technical support to European customers, by giving them a multifactorial approach of issues encountered in pig farms. These highly qualified consultants will provide services to Animine customers not only on feed formulation, but also on biosecurity and pathology.

BRAIN acquires major stakes in Biocatalysts

The bio-economy company BRAIN AG (together with its subsidiaries the “BRAIN Group” or “BRAIN“) announces the signing of a share purchase agreement between BRAIN and Biocatalysts Ltd. based in Cardiff, Great Britain, and active in the field of speciality enzymes. Therein the takeover of the majority stake of Biocatalysts’s shares by BRAIN is governed. The transaction will be completed within the first quarter of 2018. For over 35 years, Biocatalysts (and more recently Biocatalysts Inc, USA) has focused on the development, production and distribution of speciality enzymes for various industries such as food and fine chemicals. BRAIN is a leading technology company in the field of industrial biotechnology, developing microorganisms, natural substances and enzymes for the industrial use. The strategic acquisition of a majority stake in Biocatalysts is intended to accelerate product driven growth in the fast growing speciality enzyme market and broaden the portfolio of the enzyme business of BRAIN.

Nutega and Novation join the CCPA GROUP

The French group CCPA announces the acquisition of a majority stake in the capital of Spanish companies Nutega and Novation based in Madrid and Arcos de Jalon. “This operation is part of our international development strategy and allows us a significant setting-up on the European secondary market of the animal feed,” comments Laurent Roger, export sales director. Nutega and its Novation subsidiary are major Spanish actors, specialised in the manufacturing of premixes for animal feed, pre starter feed, nutritional specialties and additives, with a turnover of € 30 million. Nutega started its activities in 1995 and quickly expanded its services and premix sales activities. Founded in 2002, Novation is specialised in nutritional additives. Today the group has two specialised factories, a laboratory and a team of 50 experts working in animal nutrition. Nutega operates mainly in Spain and Novation has a strong international presence through the export of its range of additives. The management team in place will continue to manage Nutega and Novation, headed by Andres Ortiz, managing director, with the same passion and energy, serving customers who have trusted the company for more than 22 years.

Perstorp to offer advanced dosing equipment

Perstorp offers a new solution where a broad range of organic acid based additives can be combined with highly accurate dosing equipment. This unique combination, called Perstorp Perfect Mixx, can help to; optimise pellet quality, maintain the quality and safety of the feed and improve gut health and animal performance and results on the farm in general. “One of the most interesting elements of the Perfect Mixx solution is the Cibodoz. This dosing equipment can be used with different organic acid based additives, enabling feed quality and animal performance,” remarked Marc Kinjet, Perstorp’s director Preservation. “This unique machine enables more precise dosage of organic acids, simultaneous dosing of water and acids, dosing of more than one additive and precise mechanical calibration. The Cibodoz is a robust machine that is easy to use, clean and maintain.” All liquid organic acid based additives can be dosed with the Cibodoz, however Perstorp recommends to use solutions using esterified organic acids for optimal results.

Wisium and Aniprev join forces

Wisium, Neovia’s international premix brand, has signed a partnership agreement with Aniprev for the marketing of its mobile application, which combines all the relevant functions for remote poultry farm management, and also enables simultaneous sharing of production data with all industry stakeholders, including specific features for each of them. Developed in 2016 by Pierre Lanckriet, Aniprev is a decision-support tool designed and developed by a farmer for farmers. It is now used by many operators in the French poultry sector.

Kemin launches antibiotic alternatives program

Animal nutrition company Kemin Industries started the year with a series of seminars to showcase its newly launched product Aleta™ and to introduce the Kemin Antibiotic Alternatives (ABA) program in the Philippines.

Dr. William Chin, product manager for Kemin Animal Nutrition and Health, Asia Pacific, commenced each seminar with a presentation about stress as a performance inhibitor and immunity suppressor. He highlighted the factors that often cause stress to animals, which can potentially lead to poor animal performance and cause higher susceptibility to diseases.

Dr. Geoff Horst, Research and Development Lead for Kemin and inventor of Aleta, was an invited speaker for the roadshow. He presented about how animals’ immunity should be the key focus to maintaining farm performance. “Strengthening non-specific immunity in the animal will lead to healthier and more productive animals. Healthier animals will result in higher production efficiency and profitability for the producer,” said Dr. Horst. Dr. Horst shared his expertise on how the algae-derived beta-glucan could improve the animals’ natural defense mechanism, improve the animals’ resistance to stressful conditions and support their overall gut health. He emphasised that the algae-derived beta-glucan was explicitly designed to help develop the innate immune systems within young animals and enable antibiotic-free production, despite disease concerns. The seminars concluded with a discussion about the Kemin Antibiotic Alternatives (ABA) Program by Dr. Chin.