The Big Six

These six companies are the major players in agricultural genetic engineering in the private sector. Many of them have extensive plant breeding operations across the world, and then add transgenic traits to the varieties they breed.

Monsanto Company, based in St. Louis Missouri. http://www.monsanto.com/ Monsanto has the largest market share of GE crops in the world, and gets most of the press. They also have a company blog called Monsanto According to Monsanto.

Pioneer Hi-Bred International, based in Johnston, Iowa, is a subsidiary of DuPont. http://www.pioneer.com/

Syngenta AG, based in Basel, Switzerland. http://www.syngenta.com/

Dow Agrosciences, based in Indianapolis, Indiana, is a subsidiary of Dow Chemical. http://www.dowagro.com/

BASF, is based in Ludwigshafen, Germany. While primarily a chemical company, they are rapidly expanding their biotechnology division. http://www.basf.com/

Bayer Cropscience, based in Monheim, Germany, is a subsidiary of Bayer. http://www.bayercropscience.com/

Other Companies

There are a lot more companies working on genetic engineering than just the Big Six. Many of them study individual traits, and if successful in their research, may license their technology to larger companies that can incorporate it into their crops.

United States

ArborGen LLC is based in Summerville, South Carolina. They study the genetics of trees, from wood quality to restoring endangered tree species such as the American Chestnut. http://www.arborgen.com/

Arcadia Biosciences, based in Davis, California, develops nitrogen use efficiency for crops, as well as salt tolerance, and works on the healthful composition of foods. http://www.arcadiabio.com/

Exelixis is based in South San Francisco, California. http://www.exelixis.com/

Mendel Biotechnology is based in Hayward, California. They have developed a yield-increasing trait in soybeans using genetic engineering. http://www.mendelbio.com/

Targeted Growth, Inc. is based in Seattle, Washington. http://www.targetedgrowth.com/

Australia

Florigene Pty Ltd, based in Victoria, Australia, is a subsidiary of Suntory Group in Tokyo, Japan. Their research focuses on introducing new colors into ornamental flowers and have produced the world’s first purple carnations and the first true blue rose. http://www.florigene.com/

Canada

Performance Plants, Inc. is based in Kingston ON, Canada. They conduct research on abiotic stress and yield, and biofuel-related traits. http://www.performanceplants.com/

SemBioSys is based in Calgary AB, Canada. They work on pharmaceutical traits and are developing GLA-rich safflower oil. http://www.sembiosys.com/

India

Mahyco is based in Dawalwadi, India. They have partnered with Monsanto to introduce Bt cotton to India. http://www.mahyco.com/

Metahelix Life Sciences Pvt Ltd is based in Karnataka, India. They own Dhaanya Seeds. http://www.meta-helix.com/

Israel

Evogene is based in Rehovot, Israel. http://www.evogene.com/

Protalix is based in Carmiel, Israel. They conduct research on producing therapeutical proteins in plant cells. http://www.protalix.com/

The Netherlands

Genetwister Technologies B.V. is based in Wageningen in The Netherlands. They use functional genomics and expression profiling to discover important genes in plants. http://www.genetwister.nl

KeyGene is based in Wageningen in The Netherlands. Founded by several large Netherlands seed companies, it is a cooperative research group that conducts genomic research on plant genetics. One of the crops they work on is aphid-resistant lettuce. They also have a US office in Maryland. http://www.keygene.com/

South Africa

Pannar Seed Pty Ltd, based in Greytown, South Africa, is also venturing into biotechnology. http://www.pannar.com/

Do you know a company that we can add to the list? Has the status of any of these companies changed? Feel free to mention it in the comments. Comments on this page should only be used for these purposes, and will be deleted when they have been incorporated into the page. Thank you for helping us compile this list!

Popularity: 15% [?]

Anastasia Bodnar

November 15th, 2009 at 19:08

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Thanks for starting this list! I’ll be sure to add any companies that I come across. Perhaps we can also add on specific products that each company has either in development or on the market as well – it would be interesting to track if certain companies are more likely to work on bioremidiation or nutrition traits, for example.

James

November 17th, 2009 at 00:11

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I think Ceres has, or continues to do, work with genetic engineering, though it looks like a lot of there work has switched over to conventional breeding. Anyone else know more? Their website is ceres.net (using a .com sends you to a beer company instead)

MaryM

November 20th, 2009 at 22:40

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Just spotted this one I didn’t know about before: Biolex Therapeutics. Reportedly a small aquatic plant according to the article I found it in:

http://www.genengnews.com/specialreports/sritem.aspx?oid=68943994

Biolex is http://www.biolex.com/

MaryM

November 20th, 2009 at 22:46

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D’oh–I knew this one before, totally spaced: Ventria. http://www.ventria.com/

They have a rice plant that makes human milk proteins that can treat diarrhea in children.

MaryM

November 22nd, 2009 at 21:56

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David reports on a development by Origen Agritech (Nasdaq symbol – SEED) here: http://gmopundit.blogspot.com/2009/11/next-generation-gm-maize-approved-for.html

http://finance.yahoo.com/q/pr?s=SEED

MaryM

November 22nd, 2009 at 22:15

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Looking around at license applications, also found:

ORF Genetics in Iceland: http://gmoinfo.jrc.ec.europa.eu/gmp_report.aspx?CurNot=B/IS/09/01 In-field production of transgenic barley. http://www.orfgenetics.com/

BSES Limited in Australia: http://www.bses.org.au/bses_01_home.asp?page_id=0 Saw an application for transgenic sugarcane. http://www.ogtr.gov.au/internet/ogtr/publishing.nsf/Content/dir096 DIR 096 – Limited and controlled release of sugarcane genetically modified for herbicide tolerance