Mascoma Corporation

Using our proprietary consolidated bioprocessing, or CBP, technology platform, Mascoma has developed genetically-modified yeasts and other microorganisms to reduce costs and improve yields in the production of renewable fuels and chemicals. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, CBP technology is the ultimate low-cost configuration for the hydrolysis and fermentation of cellulosic feedstocks. Our CBP platform utilizes genetically modified yeast and bacteria to convert cellulosic biomass into high-value end-products in a single step that combines hydrolysis and fermentation.

Conversion of cellulosic biomass typically involves a difficult process of breaking down the complex sugars found in plant material into simple, easy-to-process sugars and then converting these simple sugars into end-products. Mascoma’s proprietary microorganisms, and its methodology for producing them, allow us to streamline the biomass conversion process and alleviate the need for high-cost enzymes in the process. Mascoma’s microorganisms have been demonstrated to convert different types of plant material into fuel and chemical end-products in industrial processing conditions. We have built on decades of research to develop and acquire a substantial intellectual property portfolio spanning the breadth of biomass conversion technologies, including in the fields of pretreatment, hydrolysis, metabolic pathway engineering, enzyme expression and process design.

Our CBP technology provides us with the ability to use a variety of feedstocks to produce multiple renewable fuel and chemical end-products. We plan to initially target the large and established first generation corn ethanol industry with our proprietary Mascoma Grain Technology, or MGT, yeast product. We are also working with leading industry participants to develop and construct commercial scale facilities to convert hardwood feedstocks into cellulosic ethanol. We believe that these facilities will offer compelling economic value to us and our collaborators based on the expected operating costs of these facilities and today’s market prices for fuel and feedstocks. In the future, we plan to expand the application of our CBP technology to develop advanced biorefineries that produce multiple high-value end-products, such as advanced fuels and chemicals, from many different feedstocks.

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