The future won’t be mined, extracted, wired or launched.
Ferment is a company creation studio building new businesses that rapidly translate biology into products that solve targeted problems across energy, materials, agriculture, health and beyond.
Ferment brings together tested company-building models, corporate strategic partners, and access to world-leading biotechnology platforms.
Active beauty and personal care arcaea.com
“Beauty through Biology”
What We Saw
Beauty brands struggled to meet new rising consumer values without sacrificing product performance. There was limited innovation in the ingredients they used, and a stark tradeoff between performance and sustainable positioning. Biotechnology was underutilized across the industry, but can help deliver better products to consumers.
What We Built
Arcaea is a company that approaches beauty through a biology first lens. Arcaea brings biotech based ingredients, new product formats, and unique stories to brands and consumers, all rooted in our skin’s relationship to biology. We partnered with entrepreneur and CEO, Jasmina Aganovic, as well as iconic bands (Chanel), innovative category disruptors (Olaplex) and sophisticated suppliers (Givaudan) to fund and build the company.
Probiotics for Human Nutrition
verbbiotics.com
What We Saw
Consumer nutrition brands were lagging in translating powerful advances in microbiome science into meaningful consumer products. People are not getting what they can from their food and, for a variety of reasons, we absorb a fraction of the available nutrients in our diet.
What we Built
We built a consumer probiotics company to leapfrog incumbents and called it Verb Biotics. Verb drives toward deep understanding around the mechanism of action of its probiotics, and using Ginkgo’s high throughput selection and genetic engineering tools, designs a new wave of probiotics with truly meaningful feel the effect nutritional benefits. Verb is led by CEO Todd Beckman.
Plant Bioactives for Human Nutrition
What We Saw
The rise of science backed nutrition for health and wellness, as an alternative to prescription medicines, is a global megatrend. For millennia, we’ve turned to plants and herbs for health and healing, but we’re only beginning to map the universe of these bioactive molecules and micronutrients. However, pure forms of bioactives are hard to access because they’re trapped inside of producer organisms—plants, fungi, and animal cells—and there’s no easy way to isolate them.
What We Built
We built Ayana Bio to integrate a discovery, synthetic biology, and process chemistry to uncover new bioactives, and reproduce existing ones, using sustainable production technology. Ayana can find, create, and scale complex molecules and molecular blends that have otherwise been locked away in plant, fungi, and animal cells. Ayana helps meet the global demand for sustainable, standardized health and wellness products.
Industrial Waste Remediation
allonnia.com
“Waste is a failure of imagination.”
What We Saw
The conversation around industrial waste streams—from food, mining, electronics, energy, and other industrials—had shifted from ‘how do we mitigate the cost of waste disposal’ to ‘how can we mine and upcycle our waste streams for value?” Chemical and mechanical remediation systems had seemingly plateaued, but biology has great abilities for treating emerging contaminant issues at scale and recovering value from waste.
What We Built
Allonnia is a company focused on using biotechnology for complex waste remediation. We partnered with strategic investors with deep knowledge of engineered remediation systems like Battelle Memorial Institute, and corporate partners with meaningful waste challenges like Canadian oil and gas giant, Suncor. Allonnia is leading the field in biological solutions for waste remediation and is led by CEO, Nicole Richards, formerly of Dupont.
Microbiome science for animal health
What We Saw
Livestock producers and veterinarians were calling for new products to address antibiotic resistance and improve livestock sustainability. Microbiome science can meet these needs, and is rapidly creating breakthroughs in animal health based on the microbial communities in animals and the surrounding environment. Ginkgo’s unique screening and strain engineering capabilities could greatly accelerate a company working on microbiome focused products for animal health.
What We Built
In partnership with Elanco and a team of experts, we developed BiomEdit, a company creating probiotics and microbial medicines for animal health. BiomEdit focuses on the greatest innovation needs in animal health, including medicated feed ingredients, nutritional health, and therapeutics for livestock and pets. The company leverages Ginkgo's cell programming platform to improve the design of probiotics and engineered microbial medicines. BiomEdit is led by CEO, Aaron Schacht, former EVP of Innovation at Elanco.
Active beauty and personal care arcaea.com
“Beauty through Biology”
What We Saw
Beauty brands struggled to meet new rising consumer values without sacrificing product performance. There was limited innovation in the ingredients they used, and a stark tradeoff between performance and sustainable positioning. Biotechnology was underutilized across the industry, but can help deliver better products to consumers.
What We Built
Arcaea is a company that approaches beauty through a biology first lens. Arcaea brings biotech based ingredients, new product formats, and unique stories to brands and consumers, all rooted in our skin’s relationship to biology. We partnered with entrepreneur and CEO, Jasmina Aganovic, as well as iconic bands (Chanel), innovative category disruptors (Olaplex) and sophisticated suppliers (Givaudan) to fund and build the company.
Probiotics for Human Nutrition
verbbiotics.com
What We Saw
Consumer nutrition brands were lagging in translating powerful advances in microbiome science into meaningful consumer products. People are not getting what they can from their food and, for a variety of reasons, we absorb a fraction of the available nutrients in our diet.
What we Built
We built a consumer probiotics company to leapfrog incumbents and called it Verb Biotics. Verb drives toward deep understanding around the mechanism of action of its probiotics, and using Ginkgo’s high throughput selection and genetic engineering tools, designs a new wave of probiotics with truly meaningful feel the effect nutritional benefits. Verb is led by CEO Todd Beckman.
Plant Bioactives for Human Nutrition
What We Saw
The rise of science backed nutrition for health and wellness, as an alternative to prescription medicines, is a global megatrend. For millennia, we’ve turned to plants and herbs for health and healing, but we’re only beginning to map the universe of these bioactive molecules and micronutrients. However, pure forms of bioactives are hard to access because they’re trapped inside of producer organisms—plants, fungi, and animal cells—and there’s no easy way to isolate them.
What We Built
We built Ayana Bio to integrate discovery, synthetic biology, and process chemistry to uncover new bioactives, and reproduce existing ones, using sustainable production technology. Ayana can find, create, and scale complex molecules and molecular blends that have otherwise been locked away in plant, fungi, and animal cells. Ayana helps meet the global demand for sustainable, standardized health and wellness products.
Industrial Waste Remediation
allonnia.com
“Waste is a failure of imagination.”
What We Saw
The conversation around industrial waste streams—from food, mining, electronics, energy, and other industrials—had shifted from ‘how do we mitigate the cost of waste disposal’ to ‘how can we mine and upcycle our waste streams for value?” Chemical and mechanical remediation systems had seemingly plateaued, but biology has great abilities for treating emerging contaminant issues at scale and recovering value from waste.
What We Built
Allonnia is a company focused on using biotechnology for complex waste remediation. We partnered with strategic investors with deep knowledge of engineered remediation systems like Battelle Memorial Institute, and corporate partners with meaningful waste challenges like Canadian oil and gas giant, Suncor. Allonnia is leading the field in biological solutions for waste remediation and is led by CEO, Nicole Richards, formerly of Dupont.
Microbiome science for animal health
What We Saw
Livestock producers and veterinarians were calling for new products to address antibiotic resistance and improve livestock sustainability. Microbiome science can meet these needs, and is rapidly creating breakthroughs in animal health based on the microbial communities in animals and the surrounding environment. Ginkgo’s unique screening and strain engineering capabilities could greatly accelerate a company working on microbiome focused products for animal health.
What We Built
In partnership with Elanco and a team of experts, we developed BiomEdit, a company creating probiotics and microbial medicines for animal health. BiomEdit focuses on the greatest innovation needs in animal health, including medicated feed ingredients, nutritional health, and therapeutics for livestock and pets. The company leverages Ginkgo's cell programming platform to improve the design of probiotics and engineered microbial medicines. BiomEdit is led by CEO, Aaron Schacht, former EVP of Innovation at Elanco.
Microbiome science for animal health
What We Saw
Livestock producers and veterinarians were calling for new products to address antibiotic resistance and improve livestock sustainability. Microbiome science can meet these needs, and is rapidly creating breakthroughs in animal health based on the microbial communities in animals and the surrounding environment. Ginkgo’s unique screening and strain engineering capabilities could greatly accelerate a company working on microbiome focused products for animal health.
What we Built
In partnership with Elanco and a team of experts, we developed BiomEdit, a company creating probiotics and microbial medicines for animal health. BiomEdit focuses on the greatest innovation needs in animal health, including medicated feed ingredients, nutritional health, and therapeutics for livestock and pets. The company leverages Ginkgo's cell programming platform to improve the design of probiotics and engineered microbial medicines. BiomEdit is led by CEO, Aaron Schacht, former EVP of Innovation at Elanco.
Probiotics for Human Nutrition
verbbiotics.com
What We Saw
Consumer nutrition brands were lagging in translating powerful advances in microbiome science into meaningful consumer products. People are not getting what they can from their food and, for a variety of reasons, we absorb a fraction of the available nutrients in our diet.
What we Built
We built a consumer probiotics company to leapfrog incumbents and called it Verb Biotics. Verb drives toward deep understanding around the mechanism of action of its probiotics, and using Ginkgo’s high throughput selection and genetic engineering tools, designs a new wave of probiotics with truly meaningful feel the effect nutritional benefits. Verb is led by CEO Todd Beckman.
Plant Bioactives for Human Nutrition
What We Saw
The rise of science backed nutrition for health and wellness, as an alternative to prescription medicines, is a global megatrend. For millennia, we’ve turned to plants and herbs for health and healing, but we’re only beginning to map the universe of these bioactive molecules and micronutrients. However, pure forms of bioactives are hard to access because they’re trapped inside of producer organisms—plants, fungi, and animal cells—and there’s no easy way to isolate them.
What we Built
We built Ayana Bio to integrate a discovery, synthetic biology, and process chemistry to uncover new bioactives, and reproduce existing ones, using sustainable production technology. Ayana can find, create, and scale complex molecules and molecular blends that have otherwise been locked away in plant, fungi, and animal cells. Ayana helps meet the global demand for sustainable, standardized health and wellness products.
Industrial Waste Remediation allonnia.com
“Waste is a failure of imagination.”
What We Saw
The conversation around industrial waste streams—from food, mining, electronics, energy, and other industrials—had shifted from ‘how do we mitigate the cost of waste disposal’ to ‘how can we mine and upcycle our waste streams for value?” Chemical and mechanical remediation systems had seemingly plateaued, but biology has great abilities for treating emerging contaminant issues at scale and recovering value from waste.
What we Built
Allonnia is a company focused on using biotechnology for complex waste remediation. We partnered with strategic investors with deep knowledge of engineered remediation systems like Battelle Memorial Institute, and corporate partners with meaningful waste challenges like Canadian oil and gas giant, Suncor. Allonnia is leading the field in biological solutions for waste remediation and is led by CEO, Nicole Richards, formerly of Dupont.
Active beauty and personal care arcaea.com
“Beauty through Biology”
What We Saw
Beauty brands struggled to meet new rising consumer values without sacrificing product performance. There was limited innovation in the ingredients they used, and a stark tradeoff between performance and sustainable positioning. Biotechnology was underutilized across the industry, but can help deliver better products to consumers.
What we Built
Arcaea is a company that approaches beauty through a biology first lens. Arcaea brings biotech based ingredients, new product formats, and unique stories to brands and consumers, all rooted in our skin’s relationship to biology. We partnered with entrepreneur and CEO, Jasmina Aganovic, as well as iconic bands (Chanel), innovative category disruptors (Olaplex) and sophisticated suppliers (Givaudan) to fund and build the company.
Tom Knight, Ginkgo Bioworks
Our studio builds with entrepreneurs to launch businesses in areas including food & nutrition, industrials & waste, materials, consumer health and more.
The tools to work with biology in a predictive way are rapidly evolving, and Ginkgo’s platform serves as the interface layer to make these capabilities available to anyone who wants to build with biology.
Tom Knight, Ginkgo Bioworks
Managing Partner
Partner