Feb 09 2010
Two Companies Collaborate in the Production of Steroid Compounds
Two companies, BRAIN AG and Bayer Schering Pharma AG, have announced a partnership in the sustainable fermentative and energy-efficient production of steroid compounds using optimized microbial production strains; as a starting material, they will use raw materials derived from plants. BRAIN AG is the European leader in white biotechnology while Bayer Schering Pharma is a global top 10 pharmaceutical corporation. Their aim is to achieve a higher yield with reduced energy input through the processing of highly developed micro-organisms called “designer bugs,” and thus lead to the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions.
Improved process
Dr. Simone Kardinahl, head of microbiological production and development in the Bergkamen plant of Bayer Schering Pharma AG, said that the industrial use of the biotechnologically optimized micro-organisms will help improve the process of steroidal intermediates conversion and help save resources. He also stated that the collaboration with BRAIN AG accelerates and supports their company’s own development regarding these activities. Plants, which contain steroidal components, are sustainable and economical sources of pharmaceutical raw materials and intermediates. Today, besides chemical methods, more and more microbial processes are being used as whole cell biocatalyst reactors for further optimization of the steroidal intermediates in plants.
In line with society and ecology
Speaking for Bayer AG, Dr. Wolfgang Plischke commented that the company can only be successful in the long term if their economic action is in line with man’s social interest and the period’s ecological needs. Dr Plischke is responsible for innovation, technology and environment within the managing board of Bayer AG. He further commented that the focus of their research and development activities is the optimization of their production processes to gain better energy efficiency. With the said process made possible by the collaboration, both parties are expecting about a 10 percent reduction of green house gas emissions.
Strategic business cooperation
Dr. Jürgen Eck, CTO of BRAIN AG, stated that technologies of modern molecular biology that is within the field of Systems Biology allows them to take selective action on the genomes of production strains. Genes with limited product yield will be modulated or substituted. Dr. Eck also added that one of the goals that this collaboration wishes to achieve is to enable the use of designer micro-organisms in the efficient production process of steroidal intermediate conversions. “For BRAIN the expansion of the collaboration with the leading industrial partner Bayer Schering Pharma AG is a continuation of the strategic co-operation business with globally successful partners,“ Dr. Eck concluded.
About the companies
BRAIN, short for Biotechnology Research and Information Network, discovers and develops novel bioactive natural compounds and proprietary enzymes for pharmaceutical industries, as well as cosmetics and food industries. The company harnesses nature’s untapped biodiversity to achieve creative solutions. Bayer Schering Pharma is a research-centric pharmaceutical company that was formed by the merger of Bayer and Schering in 2006. Perhaps best known in public for their product line of combined oral contraceptive pills, Bayer is also known in the areas of gynecology, oncology, andrology, diagnostic devices, special therapeutics, and nuclear medicine.
