Stokes Bio set for expansion after signing Monsanto deal
Limerick biotechnology firm Stokes Bio expects to expand significantly after signing a new deal with Monsanto that will see the US firm licence its technology.
Under the agreement, Monsanto will have exclusive rights to Stokes Bio’s technology for use in agriculture. The two companies will also collaborate on further research and development.
Tara Dalton, Stokes Bio cofounder and chief scientific officer, declined to comment on the value of the deal, citing confidentiality clauses in the contract.
However, she said that it would allow the company to grow considerably. Currently employing 25 people, she expected that this number would double in the next six months. The company also plans to move to a new premises, which will both accommodate the increased headcount and provide space for manufacturing of instruments.
Dalton said that the company was unusual because just over 50 per cent of its staff held PhDs. With the upcoming expansion, this proportion was likely to decrease somewhat, but Stokes Bio was likely to continue to employ a high proportion of doctoral graduates.
Stokes Bio develops a gene analysis system, which can be used to identify seeds or plants with the most desirable characteristics. Its system greatly speeds up this process and reduces the cost for its users. Mark Davies, co-founder and chief technology officer of Stokes Bio, said that the system is at least 100 times faster than currently employed methods. ‘‘It’s almost difficult to quantify, but the cost savings are of a similar order,” he said.
While the system has been sold for agricultural applications, Dalton said that the company was likely to licence it for further applications at a later date. ‘‘Our focus initially was on healthcare and we think there is still an enormous market for what we are doing in that space. What we have done here is licence it for a fraction of the total market,” she said.
Aside from this, the company will continue to concentrate on developing new products. ‘‘We are very focused on R&D and always have a pipeline of new technologies. At this stage we have built up a big patent portfolio,” said Davies.
Stokes Bio was set up in 2005 by Davies and Dalton as a spin-off company from the Stokes Institute at University of Limerick. The company’s main backer is Kernel Capital, while UL and Enterprise Ireland are also shareholders.
