Ceres, Inc.


Ceres, Inc. was a biotechnology company based in Thousand Oaks, California, United States that operated from 1996 to 2016, when it was acquired by Land O'Lakes. The company was a spinoff from UCLA researchers. It's ultimate commercial products were seeds of genetically modified crops used for biofuel production. In addition its operations in the United States, Ceres had a subsidiary in Brazil called Ceres Sementes do Brasil.

History

The company was founded in 1996 by UCLA professor Bob Goldberg and corporate partners with an initial capital of $50 million and an off-campus laboratory site overlooking Malibu, CA.
Richard Flavell was Chief Scientific Officer from 1998 until the 2012 public offering.
From its 2012 initial public offering that raised $65 million until its acquisition, it was listed on the NASDAQ exchange
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In 2012, the largest shareholders were Artal Luxembourg, Warburg Pincus, Ambergate Trust and Oxford Bioscience, while biotechnology company Monsanto had 4.8% stake. The company's president and CEO was Richard Hamilton.
On June 21, 2016, Ceres was acquired by Land O'Lakes for $17.2 million.

Products and research

Ceres sold sweet sorghum, switchgrass and high biomass sorghum seeds, starting in 2009.Ann Hinch for Farmworld Online May 7 2008 It tested biofuel production from switchgrass and miscanthus. In 2010, Ceres started to cooperate with Novozymes to improve the enzyme cocktails for biorefinery switchgrass and sweet sorghum. USAID funded Ceres' research on biotech traits and trait stacks in rice for Asia.