NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – Biogemma has licensed rights to genes from Evogene that it will use to develop corn hybrids with improved yield and drought tolerance, Evogene said today.
The corn lines Paris-based Biogemma will develop under the worldwide, exclusive agreement include genes that the companies evaluated under a collaboration agreement that was started in 2006. Biogemma and Evogene validated corn lines incorporating these genes through field trials in the US and in Israel over the past two years.
"Improved plant yield and drought tolerance are perhaps the most critical needs in today's worldwide agriculture, and as such are key targets for Evogene's ag-bio trait program," Ofer Haviv, Evogene's president and CEO, said in a statement.
Rehovot, Israel-based Evogene's core platform uses computational technologies for gene discovery and high-throughput systems for gene validation.
Financial terms of the agreement were not released.