Biotechnology company BRAIN and natural product specialist AnalytiCon Discovery have formed a partnership in the rapidly growing health and nutrition sector. Through its acquisition of the majority of AnalytiCon shares, BRAIN said that it has become a leading international company network with unique worldwide access to an extensive range of natural products, microorganisms, plants, gene libraries and the associated technologies required for identification, development and production of products based on natural substances for consumers and business partners.
Through the establishment of this alliance, many years of research and development in the field of natural products and natural extracts are combined with extensive technology platforms for the detection of novel biological activity and subsequent structure-efficacy relation-ship, the company said, noting that both companies have more than 20 years of research and development experience in an industrial environment and have already worked together successfully on a variety of industrial projects for about 10 years.
The newly created network is said to combine the complementary disciplines of biology and natural product chemistry, with the alliance also synergistically enhancing access to natural resources (often referred to as "nature's toolbox") as, in addition to the multitude of highly diverse microorganisms, an extensive range of secondary metabolisms of plants that are a source of natural products and innovative production systems are made available. BRAIN and AnalytiCon said that they aim to work alongside one another to find and implement the most economic solutions to emerging technical issues.
The intensification of these joint activities is of particular interest in the health and nutrition sector, where "all natural" concepts combined with proven biological effects are increasingly important for both market players and end users.
"AnalytiCon has been working intensively on its Drug Discovery units within the pharmaceutical industry for several years. This alliance makes it possible to further bridge the gap between the pharmaceutical, food and cosmetics industries," said Dr. Lutz Müller-Kuhrt, CEO of AnalytiCon. "Through this new alliance with its long-standing partner BRAIN, the company will be strengthened further but will continue to operate independently on the market."
"The synergy between the disciplines of biotechnology and natural product chemistry established in the alliance brings the two partners to a key position for fully integrated drug development. This is seen internationally as being very unique," said Dr. Holger Zinke, CEO of BRAIN, of the importance of the newly formed partnership. "The alliance combines the development of novel screening tests with direct access to an infinite source of natural products, therefore offering the opportunity to additionally optimise certain natural product candidates through chemical synthesis, in terms of properties such as stability, solubility or efficiency."
The new relationship will allow the two companies, said BRAIN, to strengthen their own developments for the consumer market in the future. With this in mind, the companies have worked together since February 2013 as part of the strategic alliance NatLife 2020, which has allowed natural nutraceuticals and cosmeceuticals to be identified, developed and produced with the aim of improving formulations in the food and cosmetics market.
The work of the 22 strategic alliance partners is planned to last nine years and is supported by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research. The total funding amount is €30 million.
