Diversa and Cargill Expand Collaboration Agreement

01/03/07 Diversa Corporation, a leader in the development of high-performance specialty enzymes, announced that it has expanded its collaboration agreement with Cargill to discover and develop novel enzymes for the cost-effective production of a proprietary food-related product designed to help global consumers pursuing healthy lifestyles.

In 2005, Cargill Health and Food Technologies and Diversa entered into an agreement to develop an innovative, multi-step enzymatic process to assist in the creation of a new Cargill product. This resulted in Diversa earning recognition from Cargill in late 2005 for completing the first phase ahead of schedule and with technologically superior results. Based on the success of the initial phase of the project, the companies have expanded the scope of their collaboration to develop additional enzymes to facilitate the next steps of production.

"Today's announcement underscores the successful synergy between Diversa's enzyme development platforms and Cargill's bioprocessing capabilities and interests," said Edward T. Shonsey, Diversa's chief executive officer. "It also accentuates Diversa's ability to efficiently provide custom enzyme solutions to our partners and collaborators in many different industries. Our extensive libraries of enzymes hold many novel solutions just waiting to be discovered. We are excited to expand this relationship and look forward to building future collaborations with Cargill in other strategic areas of mutual interest," said Shonsey.

"This collaboration with Diversa has produced successful results ahead of our targeted timeline," said Chris Mallett, corporate vice president, research and development, Cargill. "Our combined research teams are to be congratulated for meeting a key technical milestone. We look forward to implementing our expanded agreement and to the future success of this project."