Business
Burcon JV, Merit Functional Foods' First-of-Its-Kind Plant Protein Production Facility Commercially Ready
Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - November 10, 2021) - Burcon NutraScience Corpor...
About this update from Burcon Nutrascience Corporation
[{"type":"text","content":"Burcon JV, Merit Functional Foods' First-of-Its-Kind Plant Protein Production Facility Commercially ReadyVancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - November 10, 2021) - Burcon NutraScience Corporation (TSX: BU) (NASDAQ: BRCN) (\"Burcon or the \"Company\"), a global technology leader in the development of plant-based proteins for foods and beverages, is pleased to announce that its joint venture partner, Merit Functional Foods' new 94,000 square-foot facility in Winnipeg, Manitoba, is commercially ready to supply its best-in-class pea and canola proteins to leading food and beverage customers.\"This marks another important milestone in the journey for Burcon as a pioneer in the development of novel new plant-based protein ingredients,\" said Johann F. Tergesen, Burcon's president and chief executive officer, adding, \"Merit's new facility is now scaled to supply leading food and beverage customers with the highest purity pea and canola proteins available for use in plant-based applications.\"Construction of Merit's new first-of-its-kind plant-based protein production facility was completed in December 2020. During 2021, the engineers, technicians and management of Merit have been focused on the process of commissioning the facility, which involves planning, documenting, scheduling, testing, adjusting, verifying, and training, to provide a facility that operates as a fully functional unified system. Production capability at Merit is now at a state where Merit's team believes it is largely \"fine-tuning\" the overall facility in the commissioning process, by individually balancing the numerous unit-process-operations that together form the overall production capability. Merit produces, under license from Burcon, a lineup of innovative pea and canola protein ingredients, as well as a line of customized protein blend solutions branded as MeritPro™. Merit is now supplying leading food and beverage customers with its complete line of pea and canola protein ingredients and as it ramps up production, expects to be capable of fulfilling larger orders from its growing sales pipeline. Merit is the first and only commercial-scale facility in the world capable of producing food-grade protein from canola, the world's second-largest oilseed crop. Burcon believes Merit's canola proteins, new and exciting entrants into the pl...