Salute e Benessere
Novo Holdings to acquire Benchmark Genetics, a leader in aquaculture genetics
The Company's core genetics offering drives resource-efficiency in fish and shrimp farming by addressing key production challenges including growth rates, feed conversion and disease resistance. By combining its long-established breeding programs and the latest genomic tools, Benchmark Genetics help aquaculture producers increase quality, yield, health, and animal welfare.
The Company has customers in more than 50 countries and employs 270 people globally.
The transaction is aligned with the Novo Holdings Planetary Health Investment team's strategic focus on aquaculture technology to drive growth, innovation, and sustainability, complementing the recent investment in Stingray Marine Solutions.
"We are very pleased to announce plans to acquire the Benchmark Genetics business from Benchmark Holdings. Both animal and plant genetics hold immense potential to transform the global food industry, enabling more efficient and sustainable ways to feed a growing population. In particular, advancements in aquaculture genetics, such as those in the salmon industry, present significant opportunities to improve productivity, resilience, and environmental outcomes."
"The investment in Benchmark Genetics provides us with increased exposure to the salmon industry, which benefits from highly attractive underlying dynamics. Further it represents an opportunity to support a leading animal genetics platform with global ambitions. Partnering with an experienced management team, we are confident in the company's ability to drive meaningful advancements in this field. At Novo Holdings we are excited to leverage our industry experience and extensive network to help realise the company's full potential and contribute to sustainable growth in the aquaculture sector."
"I am very pleased to have signed an agreement to sell our Genetics business to Novo Holdings. Benchmark Genetics is a leading aquaculture genetics business with great potential and Novo Holdings is an excellent owner to take the business forward."
"I am very excited about the future of our business. We have a great opportunity ahead and look forward to continuing our journey with Novo Holdings bringing solutions to the aquaculture industry to improve productivity, resilience and sustainability."
PJT Partners are acting as financial advisor to Novo Holdings. Latham & Watkins are acting as legal advisor to Novo Holdings.
Benchmark is a leading aquaculture biotechnology company. Benchmark's mission is to drive sustainability in aquaculture by delivering products and solutions in genetics, advanced nutrition and health which improve yield, growth and animal health and welfare.
Through a global footprint in 26 countries and a broad portfolio of products and solutions, Benchmark addresses many of the major aquaculture species in all the major aquaculture regions around the world.
Novo Holdings is a holding and investment company that is responsible for managing the assets and the wealth of the Novo Nordisk Foundation. The purpose of Novo Holdings is to improve people's health and the sustainability of society and the planet by generating attractive long-term returns on the assets of the Novo Nordisk Foundation. Wholly owned by the Novo Nordisk Foundation, Novo Holdings is the controlling shareholder of Novo Nordisk A/S and Novonesis A/S (Novozymes A/S) and manages an investment portfolio with a long-term return perspective. In addition to managing a broad portfolio of equities, bonds, real estate, infrastructure and private equity assets, Novo Holdings is a world-leading life sciences investor. Through its Seed, Venture, Growth, Asia , Planetary Health and Principal Investments teams, Novo Holdings invests in life science companies at all stages of development. As of year-end 2023, Novo Holdings had total assets of EUR 149 billion . www.novoholdings.dk
Established in Denmark in 1924, the Novo Nordisk Foundation is an enterprise foundation with philanthropic objectives. The vision of the Foundation is to improve people's health and the sustainability of society and the planet. The Foundation's mission is to progress research and innovation in the prevention and treatment of cardiometabolic and infectious diseases as well as to advance knowledge and solutions to support a green transformation of society.
View original content: https://www.prnewswire.co.uk/news-releases/novo-holdings-to-acquire-benchmark-genetics-a-leader-in-aquaculture-genetics-302315282.html