Hyderabad-based Foragen Seeds partners with Israeli genomics firm
This agreement will enable Foragen to amplify its domain expertise, strengthen its standing in the forage business and rapidly expand its footprint.
Hyderabad: Israel-based NRGene has signed an agreement to transfer its India-based eight-year-old crop breeding programme of maize, rice and chilli-pepper to Hyderabad-based Foragen Seeds. NRGene selected Foragen as its Indian partner to advance the programme of seed development and product commercialisation.
Since 2012, NRGene has carried out broad molecular breeding programmes for the Indian market. The germplasms and breeding materials will significantly help in developing a commercial product pipeline suited to the various climate zones in the country and other tropical and sub-tropical countries across the world, said Dr Gil Ronen, CEO, NRGene.
This agreement will enable Foragen to amplify its domain expertise, strengthen its standing in the forage business and rapidly expand its footprint. Leveraging these strengths, the company intends to foray into the Rs 2,000 crores plus potential field crops business.
This agreement brings in extensive R&D capabilities including broad molecular breeding, mapping of complex traits, segregation of the actual breeding population and developing DNA markers for those traits.
“By using the NRGene’s genomics software solution, new varieties could be developed by significantly reducing their time to market lag,” says K Anil Kumar Reddy, MD & co-founder, Foragen Seeds.
Prabhakar Babu Gunturu, CEO & co-founder, Foragen Seeds, said, majority of the company’s forage products are indigenously developed at its R&D stations in Hyderabad and Bellary. The Bellary facility is dedicated to forage research, while the thrust of the Hyderabad R&D facility is on grain and field crop research like that of corn, rice and hot pepper. Foragen has also been exporting to several overseas markets.
After evaluation of the NRGene’s germplasm and the creation of hybrids in the coming seasons, Foragen will launch new commercial products for the Indian market, he added.
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