90
There is no doubt that AgTech innovations are experiencing a golden age and
that the current venture system represents its lifeblood. Investments funding AgTech
startups reached an all-time high in 2015, with $4.6 billion committed, followed by
$4.2 billion in 2016.
3.8 Mergers and Acquisitions
Consolidation in the seed and crop protection industry over the past decades led to
the formation of large organizations uniquely positioned to exploit increasingly
complex molecular breeding and transgenic trait development programs. During the
golden years of high seed prices, substantial capital investments into large internal
discovery engines were made by the multinationals.
Nevertheless, while transgenic input traits, including herbicide tolerance and
insect control traits, translated into increased revenues for the seed companies and
efficiency gains for farmers, investments committed to the development of transgenic agronomic traits such as intrinsic yield increase, or increased fertilizer efficiency, have yet to deliver value.
With yields increasing steadily and seed stocks in the developed world attaining
record highs, commodity prices collapsed and so did the growth of company revenues. This led to yet another round of consolidation resulting in the acquisition of
Syngenta by ChemChina, the merger of equals between Dow and DuPont, and the
acquisition of Monsanto by Bayer.
The merged firms have consolidated development pipelines which, for years to
come, will require large amounts of resources to drive product concepts toward
commercial launch. Combined with the need for these firms to reduce their marginal costs, this could put pressure on their investments in early stage discovery,
which will result in an opportunity for the startup sector and academics alike to
regain an important role in supplying the industry with the cutting-edge technologies of tomorrow.
3.9 Closing Comments
Collaborations between the private and public sector have brought about steadily
increasing yields. Incredible productivity gains have been obtained by a sophisticated industry that has successfully incorporated advanced technologies. Since the
advent of hybrid maize, yields in the United States have increased sevenfold!
Corteva Agriscience has built a maize germplasm collection that goes back over
90 years, with phenotypic data that was collected from the start and associated
genotypic data built over time. Such continuity in data collection and the coherence
of the germplasm pools are unmatched in the private or the public sectors. Combined
with an ability to precisely correlate phenotype to genotype for the past two decades,
M. L. Müller and H. Campos
There is no doubt that AgTech innovations are experiencing a golden age and
that the current venture system represents its lifeblood. Investments funding AgTech
startups reached an all-time high in 2015, with $4.6 billion committed, followed by
$4.2 billion in 2016.
3.8 Mergers and Acquisitions
Consolidation in the seed and crop protection industry over the past decades led to
the formation of large organizations uniquely positioned to exploit increasingly
complex molecular breeding and transgenic trait development programs. During the
golden years of high seed prices, substantial capital investments into large internal
discovery engines were made by the multinationals.
Nevertheless, while transgenic input traits, including herbicide tolerance and
insect control traits, translated into increased revenues for the seed companies and
efficiency gains for farmers, investments committed to the development of transgenic agronomic traits such as intrinsic yield increase, or increased fertilizer efficiency, have yet to deliver value.
With yields increasing steadily and seed stocks in the developed world attaining
record highs, commodity prices collapsed and so did the growth of company revenues. This led to yet another round of consolidation resulting in the acquisition of
Syngenta by ChemChina, the merger of equals between Dow and DuPont, and the
acquisition of Monsanto by Bayer.
The merged firms have consolidated development pipelines which, for years to
come, will require large amounts of resources to drive product concepts toward
commercial launch. Combined with the need for these firms to reduce their marginal costs, this could put pressure on their investments in early stage discovery,
which will result in an opportunity for the startup sector and academics alike to
regain an important role in supplying the industry with the cutting-edge technologies of tomorrow.
3.9 Closing Comments
Collaborations between the private and public sector have brought about steadily
increasing yields. Incredible productivity gains have been obtained by a sophisticated industry that has successfully incorporated advanced technologies. Since the
advent of hybrid maize, yields in the United States have increased sevenfold!
Corteva Agriscience has built a maize germplasm collection that goes back over
90 years, with phenotypic data that was collected from the start and associated
genotypic data built over time. Such continuity in data collection and the coherence
of the germplasm pools are unmatched in the private or the public sectors. Combined
with an ability to precisely correlate phenotype to genotype for the past two decades,
M. L. Müller and H. Campos