Company Name
Amyris Biotechnologies

Company Web Site
http://www.amyrisbiotech.com/

Headquarters
Emeryville, CA

Latest News
December 2, 2009
Amyris Biotechnologies will receive a $25 million grant from the Department of Energy. This This project will produce a diesel substitute through the fermentation of sweet sorghum. The pilot plant will also have the capacity to co-produce lubricants, polymers, and other petro-chemical substitutes.

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Amyris Biotechnologies Inc. raised $70 million in September to further tweak, cut costs and scale up production of renewable biofuel products currently under development.

Now, in another move that will take the company a step closer to its goal of getting its product into the market by 2010, Amyris formed a joint venture that will help it amass the needed feedstock and supply chain assets to produce and move its fuel.

Amyris expects to announce further details of the joint venture in January.

Funding
Amyris is supported with at least $90 million in funding from Khosla Ventures, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, DAG Ventures (Duff Ackerman & Goodrich Ventures), and Texas Pacific Group Ventures.

Technology
Amyris Biotechnologies is developing a large-scale fermentation process to renewably produce biofuels. Amyris is developing a gasoline substitute that contains more energy than ethanol, will result in lower cost and less polluting biofuel blends, and is fully compatible with today's cars and the existing petroleum infrastructure. They are also developing a diesel substitute that can achieve lower costs and greater scale than vegetable oil based biodiesels. "Our next generation biodiesel is inherently stable in cold temperatures and does not break down during storage and transport like conventional biodiesel. Both our gasoline substitute and our diesel substitute will be made from the same feedstocks and production plants that are used to make ethanol."

Amyris uses engineered microbes and rapid enzymatic pathway construction techniques to build microorganisms capable of producing high-value compounds, from renewable biofuels to pharmaceuticals.