NewLeaf Symbiotics appoints new vice-president

The US agricultural biotechnology company, NewLeaf Symbiotics (St Louis,Missouri), has appointed Mike McFatrichas vice-president for business strategy and development.

McFatrich joins the company from BASF where he was Global Director for the Seed Solutions business. He will be based at NewLeaf’s BRDG Park offices in St. Louis.

NewLeaf CEO Tom Laurita said, “Mike brings extensive experience to NewLeaf Symbiotics. He has worked in the agrochemical industry for more than 20 years, prior to which he had significant experience in the seed industry in both product development and commercial roles. He has gained broad knowledge of biological plant health products as well as conventional crop protection compounds and seed treatments. Mike held key business management roles with Gustafson/Bayer and Chemtura, and spent the last five years at Becker Underwood/BASF. He provides a strategic viewpoint that will certainly add value throughout our organization. NewLeaf is rapidly advancing its Prescriptive Biologics™ platform and product pipeline, and we expect that Mike will help us accelerate that progress.”

McFatrich commented, “NewLeaf is at the leading edge of developing biologics as a crop performance enhancement technology. The company is well positioned to bring to market a portfolio of products that will deliver on the promise that plant health and nutritional biological products have begun to provide. NewLeaf’s Prescriptive Biologics™ platform will offer unique solutions for the crop protection market. I’ve been fortunate to work in both crop production and crop protection, and understand how biologics can complement traditional crop protection tools and augment the genetics of a crop plant to optimize the inherent yield potential. I believe NewLeaf has brought together key values of innovation, customer focus, collaboration and sustainability which will provide the grower, and those who service the grower, with the opportunity to deliver food, fiber and fuel to the world’s growing population in an environmentally prudent way.”