Solazyme, Inc., now known as TerraVia™, a pioneer in algae innovation and a food, nutrition and specialty ingredients company, has signed a definitive multi-year global supply agreement with Unilever. The five-year agreement provides for Unilever to purchase renewable algae oils for use in personal care products and reflects the culmination of more than seven years of collaboration between Solazyme and Unilever.
This new agreement builds upon Solazyme’s initial supply relationship with Unilever for renewable algae oils, which Unilever began incorporating into its products in 2014. These oils are being produced and delivered to Unilever routinely from the Solazyme Bunge Renewable Oils facility. This new five-year, multi-oil supply agreement includes a broad portfolio of oils for use in its personal care products. Production of these oils will take place at the Solazyme Bunge Renewable Oils facility in Brazil and pricing terms are based upon variable production cost plus a defined contribution margin. Oils purchased under this new supply agreement are expected to represent total revenue of more than $200 million over the term of the agreement.
Jonathan Wolfson, TerraVia’s CEO, commented, “Our mission is to deliver products from algae that are better for people and better for our planet. We are proud to partner with Unilever, a global leader in health and wellbeing, whose products touch over 2 billion people on any given day. The growth of our partnership reflects over seven years of collaboration during which we have demonstrated our ability to develop and deliver unique, high performance, and highly sustainable oils at scale, as we continue our shift to focusing on higher value products.”
Alan Jope, Personal Care President of Unilever said, “The decision to use algae oils is fully aligned with the Unilever Sustainable Living Plan and with our goal to grow the business while reducing our overall environmental footprint. We have been working with Solazyme for many years to develop novel ingredients from algae, which improve the performance and sustainability profile of our personal care products. Solazyme has already been delivering consistent, sustainable and high performing algae oils, and we look forward to this next and greatly expanded commercial phase of the relationship.”
The Solazyme Bunge Renewable Oils facility in Brazil produces more oil per hectare/acre with a lower greenhouse gas footprint than nearly all major commercially available plant oils. The Brazil facility embodies the principles of sustainable production and is co-located with a Bonsucro®-certified sugarcane mill that uses the waste sugarcane material (bagasse) as an efficient, renewable source of energy.
About TerraVia™
TerraVia™ (formerly Solazyme®), is a next generation food, nutrition and specialty ingredients company that harnesses the power of algae, the mother of all plants and earth’s original superfood. With a portfolio of breakthrough ingredients and manufacturing, the Company is well positioned to help meet the growing need of consumer packaged goods and established and emerging food manufacturers to improve the nutritional profile of foods without sacrificing taste, and to develop select consumer brands. The Company also manufactures a range of specialty personal care ingredients for key strategic partners. Headquartered in South San Francisco, the Company’s mission is to create products that are truly better for people and better for the planet.
Solazyme®, TerraVia™, the Solazyme logo and other trademarks or service names are the trademarks of Solazyme, Inc.
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Sustainable Brands Staff
Published Mar 21, 2016 11pm EDT / 8pm PDT / 3am GMT / 4am CET