The Slovenian biotechnology company Acies Bio has entered a partnership with the German chemical giant BASF to further develop a platform for fermentation technology from methanol for the production of fatty alcohols, which are used in the production of home and personal care products.

Acies Bio has developed a fully flexible synthetic biology platform, called OneCarbonBio, designed to efficiently convert renewable methanol obtained from captured carbon dioxide emissions into various chemical feedstocks.

As part of the partnership, BASF's Care Chemicals division and Acies Bio, which is based in the Ljubljana Technology Park, will use specialised microbes and increase the volume of fermentation process to produce fatty acids and derivatives used to produce various chemical compounds.

Fatty alcohols are the essential building blocks of many ingredients in the home and personal care market, especially surfactants.

BASF will contribute its expertise in developing processes, providing comprehensive value chain solutions and enabling access to global markets.

The German chemical producer expects increased volume and flexibility, which would lead to diversification of its portfolio of renewable feedstocks and help increase the resilience of the global supply chain of the Care Chemicals division.

"Biotechnology complements our chemistry to create a more sustainable future," Matthias Maase of Care Chemicals BASF said as the partnership was announced on 5 November, adding that his company was "pleased to have found the right partner in Acies Bio to further develop this innovation at an early stage."

The research scope of the partnership covers the entire chain from production strain development to large scale manufacturing, which will be of benefit to customers in personal care, home care, industrial and institutional cleaning and industrial formulators worldwide.

Gregor Kosec, the director of R&D at Acies Bio, said that "partnering with BASF marks an important milestone, reflecting a significant recognition of Acies Bio's R&D efforts," adding that by combining the OneCarbonBio platform with BASF's process development and supply chain expertise, the company was "poised to bring our technologies to a global scale."

He believes the collaboration demonstrates the transformative potential of Acies Bio's microbial innovations to drive net-zero production of specialty and industrial chemicals.