Yield10 Bioscience provides update on Omega-3 Camelina program

Yield10 Bioscience provided an update on its Omega-3 Camelina program. The company has taken the strategic decision to prioritize in 2024 the execution of activities intended to accelerate and advance the Omega-3 Camelina program toward commercialization. Yield10 also reported that it has completed contra season production in Chile of Omega-3 EPA8 Camelina, which produces the eicosapentaenoic acid, or EPA, component of the omega-3 oil found in fish. The EPA8 Camelina variety is intended to produce EPA oil for the significant market opportunity in aquafeed and human nutrition. In 2024, subject to the availability of sufficient financial resources, Yield10 plans to continue to execute seed scale-up of EPA8 Camelina to enable production of the company’s first commercial omega-3 product for use in aquafeed. The company is also transferring the EPA trait into proprietary Yield10 herbicide tolerant Camelina germplasm to boost in-field agronomics and yield. To enable planting of Omega-3 Camelina without restrictions in the U.S. as well as to de-regulate oil and meal, Yield10 is progressing the execution of a regulatory program involving U.S. Department of Agriculture Animal & Plant Health Inspection Service, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the FDA. In the fall of 2023, the company contracted 50 acres of contra season production of the EPA8 Camelina in Chile. The crop was recently harvested, and the cleaned seed is in inventory for future use. Yield10 is currently investigating options for seed crushing to extract oil and the pilot scale production of aquafeed formulations. The primary source of the essential fatty acids EPA and DHA is currently ocean-caught fish, where omega-3 oil produced from anchovy harvest is the industry benchmark. The company believes based on recent reports that this supply has reached a tipping point which may constrain future growth and result in severe price volatility in the market. Producing omega-3 fatty acids in Camelina, has the potential to enable a cost effective, scalable omega-3 oil production platform to meet the growing global market demand for EPA and DHA omega-3s for aquafeed, pet food and human use. In 2020, Yield10 signed an exclusive collaboration agreement with Rothamsted to support Rothamsted’s Flagship Program to develop omega-3 oils in Camelina. As part of the collaboration agreement, the Company received an exclusive option to sign a global, exclusive license agreement for the technology. Yield10 has exercised this option and is working to finalize the global exclusive license with Rothamsted. In October 2023, Yield10 announced it had signed a non-binding letter of intent, or LOI, with BioMar Group, a global aquafeed producer, to form a partnership to commercialize Camelina engineered to produce omega-3 oil for use as a high-quality supplement to the scarce supply of marine long-chain fatty acids used in aquafeed. The companies are working to develop a collaborative program to bring this new source of high-quality EPA and EPA+DHA omega-3 oils to the market. In 2023, the company filed a request for Regulatory Status Review with USDA-APHIS for Camelina engineered to produce EPA and it filed a second RSR application for Camelina engineered to produce omega-3 oil containing both EPA and DHA fatty acids. Responses are pending from USDA-APHIS.