In Hawaii, Cellana, a leading developer of algae-based bioproducts, is selling its six-acre production and research facility known as the Kona Demonstration Facility (KDF) to Cyanotech Corporation as it ceases research work after succeeding and instead is focusing on moving to commercialization. Cellana is planning on developing a larger plant for commercial-scale production of it’s ReNew Algae and hopes
Based in large part on a new commercial agreement with POS Bio-Sciences, as well as the company’s relationships with its commercial partners Living Ink Technologies and Neste, in May 2018, Cellana signed a term sheet for $27 million of debt-based project financing with an undisclosed project financing partner for a proposed 54-acre commercial algae facility to be located adjacent to KDF. The proposed 54- acre commercial algae facility is expected to produce 700 to 800 metric tons of KA32 algae (on a dry weight basis) annually with estimated pre-tax cash margins of over 50%, based on the yield, price, and cost estimates provided to the project financing partner.
Martin Sabarsky, Cellana’s Chief Executive Officer, stated, “KDF was designed to allow Cellana to identify, develop, and demonstrate commercially significant yields of algae strains for large-scale commercialization. This mission has been successfully accomplished with Cellana’s leading strain of algae, KA32, and so this is a great opportunity to reduce our current operational expenses while we sharpen our focus on commercialization with our expanding set of commercial and project financing partners.”