Dr Andrew Lee, CEOYet, the destiny of overripe bananas remains largely overlooked.
Biotech Research Company LyteGro casts a spotlight on this issue.
In the U.S. and UK alone, billions of bananas are discarded by consumers or left unsold by retailers, a reality mirrored in the plight of banana-producing farmers, who see up to 30 percent of their crop rejected by exporters without compensation.
This results in 30 million tons of bananas decomposing in landfills annually, emitting greenhouse gases equivalent to 400 million tons of CO2 emissions.
LyteGro is poised to change this narrative by turning this overlooked waste into a global opportunity.
Mixing the pulp of discarded overripe bananas with water and using clever filtration, the company has developed BacLyte.
BacLyte is essentially a water-based black banana smoothie, which becomes a powerful booster to supercharge the growth of bacteria, yeast, and fungi.
BacLyte and its derived products act like ‘steroids for microbes,’ enabling users to reduce process times and increase efficiency, resulting in superior yields and heightened productivity.
Leveraging BacLyte, LyteGro has developed two products—Propagreater, a yeast accelerator used to accelerate alcohol fermentations in distilling and MediaBoost, a simple supplement used to enhance growth in microbial cultures used in the R&D sector and in diagnostics, accelerating critical tests for life-threatening conditions like sepsis and other bacterial infections.
They are also exploring application of their technology in biofuel generation and in the production of proteins and probiotics.
A Game-Changing Innovation that Started with a Simple Idea
In 2015, an exploratory research project by Professor Mark Lyte— known for his pioneering work in Microbial Endocrinology—led to an unexpected discovery.
While studying the impact of stress hormones, particularly catechols and catecholamines, on gut microbiota, Professor Lyte expanded his research to include their counterparts found in fruits and vegetables.
Delving into the effects of water-based extracts from a diverse selection of produce on gut microbes, he observed an unexpected reaction when introducing a banana extract which resulted in an astounding surge in microbial growth.
During this period, Professor Lyte was also collaborating with Dr. Andrew Lee, a PhD scientist, inventor and a distinguished expert in technology commercialisation, on another project.
Upon reviewing the results of the banana extract experiments, Dr. Lee immediately recognised the far-reaching industrial applications of this technology in the food, pharma, and industrial biotechnology sectors.
Today, as CEO, Dr. Lee directs LyteGro’s growth and innovation strategies while Professor Lyte serves as CSO, continuing his scholarly pursuits as a Professor of Veterinary Microbiology and Preventive Medicine at Iowa State University. Their leadership is complemented by COO Amin Premji, a veteran entrepreneur with a notable background in the specialist plastics industry.
Driving Ecological Efficiency in Distillation
LyteGro’s innovation stands at the intersection of efficiency and sustainability, empowering the distilling and bioenergy sectors to streamline processes and amplify yield.
BacLyte and its derived products act like ‘steroids for microbes,’ enabling users to reduce process times and increase efficiency, resulting in superior yields and heightened productivity
Take, for example, Propagreater—a product specifically engineered as a yeast pre-treatment for distillers to optimise alcohol fermentations. A six-hour pre-treatment with Propagreater can halve fermentation times and boost alcohol yield by an impressive 10 to 20 percent. Distilleries can attain their production targets with fewer cycles, conserving time and resources and smaller distilleries now have a low-cost solution enabling them to potentially double their output without having to purchase new equipment or expand their facilities.
A critical impact assessment performed by Critical Future, a specialist London-based consultancy underlined the substantial benefits of a single LyteGro production plant producing 250,000 litres of Propagreater. Its output can enable distillers to bring about remarkable annual savings of around 20,000 tons of CO2 emissions, over 10,000 tons of feedstock, and 83 million litres of drinkable water.
“Our technology not only advances industry efficiency but also conserves millions of litres of clean waterfor public use,” says Dr Andrew Lee, CEO of LyteGro.
It’s a win-win for both the industry and the environment.
A Circular Factory of the Future
Productivity, progress, and patents are the three trajectories firmly rooted in LyteGro’s sustainable future.
The company is gearing up to secure over 4 million pounds through a Series A funding round in early 2024. This capital is earmarked to establish a state-of-the-art production facility in the U.K., which will specialise in crafting Propagreater for the burgeoning UK and European distillery markets.
Its ascent to this juncture is propelled by strategic alliances, notably with the UK government’s innovation arm, Innovate UK. LyteGro’s participation in an Innovate UK-sponsored delegation at the AFTEA 23 agrifood expo in Singapore led to meetings with the ambassador, the CEO of the Earthshot Prize, and various companies. These interactions will facilitate the expansion of LyteGro’s intellectual property portfolio into new and exciting sectors and has resulted in the exploration of production partnerships in Southeast Asia.
The ongoing support from Innovate UK has already started bearing fruit in multiple arenas. LyteGro has received grant support to partner with the BEACON Biorefinery at Aberystwyth University, where they have prepared comprehensive manufacturing protocols and quality control procedures for their products at a large pilot scale, using waste banana feedstock from fruit and fresh produce company Fyffes UK.
Looking ahead, LyteGro is charting a course for the future with a fully circular production model brought to life by its upcoming factory.
This facility, with the striking capability to produce a quarter million litres of Propagreater, is set to become the true definition of sustainability. Designed to be a closed-loop system, it will not only transform waste into energy but create valuable by-products such as graphene and organic fertilisers which can contribute to the restoration of soil vitality.
Intellectual property will remain LyteGro’s other strategic growth pillar. The company has established a robust market foothold, securing patents in both the U.S. and UK for its innovative BacLyte technology, and is extending its protective reach to an international scale, targeting patent coverage for Propagreater in over 60 territories.
As 2023 draws to a close, LyteGro is poised to expand its patent portfolio further, entering new domains with potential filings in biomass conversion, bioenergy generation, and protein synthesis technologies.
The Strategic Edge of First-Mover Innovation
No other company harnesses waste bananas to engineer products that drive significant impact within the green economy. With an eye towards rapid global expansion, plans are in motion to establish joint ventures with sovereign entities, banana trade authorities, farmer cooperatives, and waste management enterprises across the globe.
This dedication to environmental stewardship underscores LyteGro in the competitive biotech research space.
LyteGro is currently exploring the potential for joint venture partnerships in India, Singapore, and Indonesia and also has interest in Australia, Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean. These discussions are key to its huge ambition of establishing partner-operated 50 plants globally by the end of 2028.
Should LyteGro attain its targets, the company and its affiliates stand to yield annual revenues in the hundreds of millions of pounds.
Through direct reduction of banana waste going into landfill and via the increased process efficiency customers, the firm is projected to curtail greenhouse annual CO2 emissions by the equivalent of a million tons and diminish water consumption within the distilling industry by upwards of four billion litres.
The social impact of this ambition is massive too. Setting up plants globally will open up jobs in banana-growing territories and see banana farmers paid for the 30 percent of waste they currently see discarded into landfills. Further opportunities will arise to work with local entrepreneurs to find sales for each plant’s output, with commissions paid on new business and further enriching the local communities around their plants.
Because their products lock away carbon, LyteGro anticipates that each plant will be able to generate over 300,000 pounds in carbon offset credits, which the firm commits to use to fund charitable projects in the communities housing its factories.
The company is actively seeking potential partners who share its vision and are eager to join forces in its mission to positively impact the world through its high-tech banana smoothies.
