Big Strides for Small Microbes
For ag tech startup NewLeaf Symbiotics, helping a crop meet its full potential begins with what’s already growing on it: pink-pigmented facultative methylotrophs (PPFMs).
And while PPFMs may not be part of everyone’s everyday vocabulary, NewLeaf president and CEO Brent Smith says they are part of our everyday lives.
“These microbes are naturally occurring. They are on every plant that you would ever see, on the salad you eat, on the grass that you grow, on the trees that you look at, and everything in between,” Smith says.
The team at NewLeaf works to isolate strains of these microbes and research what they can do to benefit crops.
“We optimize them for the things that they’re good at, and then we produce them to optimal concentrations for the optimal outcomes,” Smith says. “It helps us harness actionable solutions to some of farmers’ biggest challenges like yield, crop protection, nutrient use efficiency and methane mitigation.”
Smith compares the abilities of the different strains of PPFMs to the abilities of different humans: some are highly intelligent, some naturally athletic, and some could be both.
“Our products do a lot of different things, but they do them in very specific prescriptive ways,” he says. “It isn’t throwing the same product out that does a lot of things – it’s a strain that does a thing to deliver an outcome. And that’s a little unique for a biological company.”
Over the past decade, the company has been focused on one thing and doing it well – successfully sequencing 6,500 strains of the technology and obtaining over 200 patents. With two of the strains for use in corn and soybeans currently available through retail and channel partners, such as BioWake through AMVAC, Revline Hopper Throttle through Meristem, and NewLeaf Technology+Dust through Low Mu Tech, NewLeaf is looking toward a large-scale expansion in 2024.
“In 2023, our products were applied on 3.5 million acres and we’re on track and expecting almost 11 million acres treated this year,” Smith says. “We’ve launched our corn rootworm bioinsecticide and we’re also launching our cotton and peanut biostimulant products. So we’ll have three new products on the market this year and an additional 50 projects and products in our pipeline.”
As far as the projects that are still in the works, the company plans to launch 10 new products over the next two to three years as well as expand into nine additional countries outside of the U.S. And as they hit the gas pedal on growth, Smith shares NewLeaf’s five-year plan focuses on five key areas.
“We spent time building out our plan and it’s focused on expanding and scaling our row crop market presence, entering specialty crop, entering international, nutrient use efficiency, and methane mitigation – primarily in rice,” he says.
Through their expansion, NewLeaf plans to continue partnering with product manufacturers and distributors to deliver their products through the ag retail channel – something Smith feels can be a win-win situation.
“We source our technology to our partners and help them build their brand equity in the market,” he says. “They can feel confident in those brands and confident in presenting that to their customers, and we're fully supporting and standing behind those technologies.”
