Business Roundup

Arkema says it may double capacity of sulfur derivatives used to make animal feed at its site in Beaumont, Texas. The additional capacity would supply a production facility making methionine hydroxy analog—an essential amino acid for animal nutrition—in Calhoun County, Texas, planned by Novus International.

EcoRobotix, a Swiss start-up, has raised $10.8 million from Capagro, BASF Venture Capital, and others after successful pilot projects demonstrated its autonomous herbicide-squirting robots. The firm says the funds will help it expand its portfolio of robots for weed elimination and enter European markets.

Celanese is closing a 20,000-metric-ton-per-year acetate tow plant in Ocotlán, Mexico, by the end of the year because of declining demand for the material, used in cigarette filters. A 50,000-metric-ton-per-year acetate flake plant on the site will remain open.

Ingenza, a spin-off from the University of Edinburgh, will collaborate with the University of Dundee and Drochaid Research Services to reduce waste CO₂ from industrial fermentation operations. The project will receive $24 million from Zero Waste Scotland, a government organization.

Agilent Technologies has acquired Ultra Scientific, a supplier of chemical standards and certified reference materials for analytical laboratories. A long-time Agilent supplier, Ultra has 52 employees.

Bruker has acquired Sierra Sensor, a Hamburg, Germany-based maker of surface plasmon resonance detection instruments. Sierra Sensor’s high-throughput instruments are used for drug discovery.

Denali Therapeutics will spend $24 million to acquire F-star Gamma. The companies have been collaborating on the development of antibodies to deliver drugs across the blood-brain barrier under a licensing arrangement that combined F-star’s technology for producing bispecific antibodies with Denali’s Transport Vehicle drug delivery platform. Denali could pay up to $447 million in milestone payments on projects under way.

Jilin Shulan Synthetic Pharmaceutical, a major caffeine producer, received an FDA warning letter that also banned its products from the U.S. market. Government inspectors uncovered numerous deviations from Good Manufacturing Practices, including managers signing batch records before the batches were made.