Benson Hill Expands Innovation Pipeline with Enhanced Traits for Animal Feed, Soybean Oil, and Biofuels

Benson Hill, Inc. (NYSE: BHIL, the “Company” or “Benson Hill”), a seed innovation company, announced on July 16, 2024, further advancements in its innovation pipeline to provide enhanced traits for key soy markets, including animal feed, soybean oil, and biofuels. Currently in field testing, these innovations uniquely position Benson Hill to revolutionize U.S. soy for feed and fuel, offering novel benefits across the agribusiness value chain.

"No other seed company is concentrating on soy quality traits for specific end markets," said Deanie Elsner, Chief Executive Officer of Benson Hill. " Given our vast soybean data, exclusive soy germplasm, and the extensive analysis of millions of data points, we are confident in our ability to meet the demands of soy end users with unmatched precision and efficiency.. Whether we're enhancing the nutritional value of soybean meal or improving oil quality, Benson Hill is set to raise the standard for U.S. soy over the next decade."

The company's objective to enhance yield, protein, and oil in the soybean genome aims to align current soy composition more closely with its desired applications. For instance, 'dual value beans'—soybean varieties that can simultaneously provide enhanced soybean meal with either superior quality oil for consumption or improved oil for the growing biofuels market—are progressing swiftly in Benson Hill's pipeline. These developments are accompanied by product candidates that maximize protein and yield.

"The speed at which we've increased yield, boosted protein, and expanded maturity zones since 2019 surpasses anything I've seen in the industry, directly attributable to our technology and focus," said Jason Bull, Chief Technology Officer of Benson Hill. " Our upcoming innovations are geared towards achieving targeted outcomes such as enhanced digestibility, increased feed energy density, and improved oil quality. We believe these technological advancements will generate significant downstream value."

To realize this potential, Bull outlined three primary areas of focus for Benson Hill's pipeline through 2032:

1. Enhance Varieties for Near-Term Impact in Animal Feed (Projected Launches 2024-2027): By boosting yield potential and expanding geographic maturities for its proprietary genetics across the U.S., Benson Hill aims to provide superior soybeans for feed applications, such as poultry, by increasing protein and metabolizable energy. Benson Hill recently confirmed the advantages of its exclusive soybean meal in collaboration with industry leader Perdue Farms. Bull anticipates that the expanded maturities in the Company’s innovation pipeline will enable more soybean farmers and seed partners to utilize its proprietary portfolio. As noted in its Q1 earnings update, the Company will continue to pursue broadacre expansion in feed and fuel, expecting to expand its soybean portfolio to approximately 35 varieties by 2025. Non-GMO, Ultra-High Protein Low-Oligosaccharide (UHP-LO) soybean varieties, intended for animal feed, are expected to yield on par with elite GMO commercial varieties by 2026-27, with herbicide-tolerant varieties now scheduled for 2026, a year earlier than previously communicated. Incorporating herbicide tolerance will simplify weed control and enable large-acre adoption of Benson Hill UHP-LO varieties in the coming years.

2. Improve Oil for Biofuels and Crude Oil Soy Markets (Projected Launches 2028-2030): Benson Hill is preparing to introduce a range of soybean varieties for biofuels and crude oil applications by the end of the decade. Leveraging years of field testing and genomic data, researchers have recently identified promising variety candidates that could serve a total addressable domestic market of approximately 50 million U.S. soybean acres. This initiative underscores the Company’s commitment to sustainability and highlights the role of soybeans in advancing renewable energy solutions.

3. Enhancing Value Creation for Animal Feed through New Soy Quality Traits (Projected Launches 2032 and Beyond): Looking ahead, Benson Hill plans to improve value creation in animal feed by developing high-yielding soybean varieties with increased energy density, enhanced protein quality, improved oil content, and reduced anti-nutritional factors. These advancements are expected to bring substantial benefits downstream in the animal feed industry.

Benson Hill’s strategic advantage in soybean seed advancements lies in its proprietary genetics, CropOS®, and the Crop Accelerator. At present, the company markets 22 commercial soybean varieties that leverage globally renowned germplasm acquired in 2019. CropOS, its AI-driven technology platform, facilitates the discovery of new traits through a dynamic data lake of agronomic and genetic information. Since 2021, over 24,000 candidate soybean varieties have been developed and advanced through CropOS, leveraging billions of data points that inform a predictive breeding success rate on par with top competitors. Since its inauguration in 2021, the Crop Accelerator, a cutting-edge rapid prototyping facility, has facilitated over 200 crop cycles for plant breeders. These differentiated core technologies, combined with CRISPR gene editing approaches resulting in over 150 gene edits to date, empower Benson Hill to achieve advancements in protein, oil, and end-use traits, keeping the Company at the forefront of soy seed innovation.

Scientific advisors, who regularly assess the progress and implementation of these technologies, have affirmed Benson Hill’s competitive advantage.

“Integrating state-of-the-art computational prediction, leading molecular marker technology, and the Crop Accelerator at the core of their plant breeding process has enabled Benson Hill to achieve rapid genetic advancements on complex traits,” said Jon Lightner, former Chief Scientific Officer for Genus PLC and a founding member of the Benson Hill Scientific Advisory Board (SAB). “It is genuinely revolutionary.”

Gary Fogel, SAB member and Chief Executive Officer of Natural Selection, Inc., agreed, noting, "Benson Hill continues to demonstrate excellence in employing artificial intelligence and machine learning for predictive modeling in plant breeding." These methods enable rapid computational screening of hundreds of thousands of potential plant development paths, resulting in biological insights and maximized market opportunities. Newly predicted outcomes are swiftly assessed prior to field testing. This comprehensive innovation pipeline revolutionizes trait discovery in plants as part of an unmatched, holistic go-to-market strategy.”