Sichuan Lomon Bio Takes S-ABA and Gibberellin as Core Products to Build Full Range Product Line on Basis of Biotechnology
Date:11-05-2018
Q1: Can you brief the development history of Sichuan Lomon Bio Technology Co., Ltd., the wholly owned subsidiary of the global leading enterprise Lomon Corporation in Titanium chemical and phosphorus chemical, and its industrial layout in the plant growth regulator (PGR) market to the readers?
Lomon Corporation is a large private group, dedicated to the comprehensive development and utilization of phosphorus chemicals, Titanium chemicals, biochemical and vanadium titanium magnetite, and headquartered in Chengdu, with four industrial bases located in Deyang, Xiangyang, Meishan and Panzhihua. Its main products include IMAP, feed grade/ fertilizer grade calcium hydrogen phosphate, agricultural grade monoammonium phosphate/ diammonium phosphate, rutile titanium dioxide, raw materials and preparations of biological pesticides, with average annual sales of RMB10 billion.
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Wang Min
President of Sichuan Lomon Bio
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Lomon Corporation aims at serving farming. It has invested significant funds and staff to develop its product lines, simultaneously strengthening its cooperation with industrial leaders in countries across the world, and continuously improving its capacity and product quality. Currently, it ranks first in Asia in production capacity of highend titanium dioxide and feed grade phosphate, and ranks first across the world in the production capacity of S-ABA.
Founded in 2000, Sichuan Lomon Bio Technology Co., Ltd., the wholly owned subsidiary of Lomon Corporation, has become the world's largest S-ABA manufacturer, with an annual production capacity of 50 tons of S-ABA TC and 120 tons of GA3 TC; moreover, it has also developed a wide range of formulated products and new fertilizers on the basis of abundant TC resources.
As a leading enterprise producing microbial fermented plant growth regulator in China, and an initiator and member of China Biostimulants Development Alliance, Lomon Bio has strong R&D and 19 international and domestic patents. Moreover, it has established close cooperation with well-known biological pesticide enterprises throughout the world, along with domestic and foreign colleges, universities and research institutes, and its products are popular in Europe, the US, Japan, Australia, India, and other countries.
Q2: Can you brief the PGRs about your company and their competitive edge, and how does your company intend to forge their core products and develop the global market?
Lomon Bio, as the first enterprise realizing industrialized production of S-ABA across the world, holds a market share of more than 90% in the world S-ABA market by depending upon its years of technical accumulation and product advantages. However, Lomon is not satisfied with its position, and believes it can go further in the vast farming field.
Relying on its excellent scientific research team and years of crude drug and preparation production and application technologies, Lomon has geared to the market development, responded to the national call, and aimed at reaching more achievements in the biological pesticide field, which has led to the successful incubation of Lomon 920- Gibberellic Acid (GA3).
Having benefited from the global horizon, global resources, best strain cultivation selected, and 18-year fermentation technology, Lomon has not only reached the world class level in product quality, but also done its best in cost control, as well as maintained the competitive edge of excellent products. As a biological pesticide enterprise, paying equal attention to crude drugs and preparations, Lomon Bio has emphasized not only the development of crude drugs, but also the application of its products in agricultural production.
It has not only the scientific research experts launching new products, but also scholars with many honorable titles and working in the field. The mastering of tremendous primary field data has promoted in-depth scientific research, while the scientific research can realize more efficient production, and thus form a cycle to maintain the brand advantage of Lomon from crude drugs to preparations. Rooted in the biological pesticide field, the company has taken ABA and gibberellin as its core products, built its full range product lines from crude drugs to preparation, perfected domestic and foreign registration, and formed effective cluster advantages by depending upon its cutting-edge in technology, funding and certification. Moreover, the company has also promoted its products by taking advantage of the foreign trade advantage and perfect domestic trade channels of the Group, and formed a worldwide brand advantage.
Q3: Doctor of Agriculture Yasuo Kamuro from the University of Tokyo once said that in Japan, S-ABA had become an essential medicament for producing high quality grapes. Can you elaborate on the application of S-ABA in the world's major markets, and the room for further growth and breakthrough?
Just as DAG Yasuo Kamuro said, taking grapes as the cut-in point, S-ABA has been used widely in the origins of the world's major grapes, after continuous practical utilization. Besides China, S-ABA has been highly recognized in the grape market in the US, Brazil, Chile, Australia, Japan, and Southeast Asia, for its excellent performance in improving the coloring of grapes.
As we all know, the color of the grape berry is crucial to the appearance of such fruits. The veraison of grapes, to which S-ABA has been sprayed, has been shortened remarkably, which realizes the early launch of grapes. Moreover, S-ABA, as a natural hormone, is different from other artificial hormones. It has not shortened the storage period of grapes, while launching grapes ahead of schedule, and has not only considered the quality and transportation distance of grapes, but also realized high its economic value.
The above is the field in which S-ABA has been used when the grapes are mature. However, besides promoting the coloring of grapes, S-ABA still has another very important function, that is, when light conditions are poor, or the weather is cold or hot, S-ABA, together with normal use of fertilizers and pesticides, can ensure that crops realize output, just as when the wind and rain come in their time, because it can double crops’ absorption of minerals, such as nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium, under unfavorable environmental conditions, and enhance the adversity resistance of crops. This character also makes S-ABA tohave broad market prospects. It can be said that S-ABA belongs to the “regulator” among regulators. The bottleneck of its marketing is its industrial production costs.
Currently, Sichuan Lomon Bio Technology Co., Ltd., as the world’s first enterprise realizing the industrialized production of S-ABA, has created continuous innovations in the industrialized production and practices to continuously cut down the S-ABA production costs and finally accomplish the purpose of mass application in farming.
In China, besides grapes, S-ABA has been applied widely in cash crops, such as orange, tomato, apple, tobacco, etc. Next, the company will focus on the application of S-ABA to high-quality varieties of cash crops. Once S-ABA can realize breakthroughs in more high-quality cash crops, like those achieved in grape, it will have a vast room for growth.
Moreover, the company has realized the popularity of S-ABA among field crops with relatively low value in some regions, and crops due to the reduced production costs of S-ABA. For example, S-ABA, when being used for Japan’s high-quality rice, has achieved remarkable effects in improving the germination percentage of rice seeds, rootage during the seedling stage, and seed-setting rates during the pre-earing stage, and the research showed that it had increased rice yields by 15%-18%.
China, as a large rice producing country, take the three provinces in the Northeast China as an example, has a rice planting area of about 4.60 million hectares. Along with the consumption upgrading in China, the demand for high-quality rice in the market will also become exuberant, and by then the demand for S-ABA will also surge.
Q4: Your parent company, Lomon Corporation, is a world noted fertilizer enterprise. What active attempts have your company taken in combining the PGRs and traditional fields of strength, helping improve the utilization rate of fertilizers, improving the quality of agricultural products, and obtaining higher agricultural added-value, and can you use any data to demonstrate the market performance of your products?
Lomon Corporation has always been dedicated to serving modern agriculture. Its subordinate enterprises, such as Lomon Land, Lomon Bio and Lomon Agricultural Technology Courtyard, have served agriculture from many aspects, different platforms and stages. Lomon Land Co., Ltd. has devoted itself to the production and sale of several fertilizers, such as phosphate fertilizers, compound fertilizers, fulvic acid compound fertilizer, etc.; Sichuan Lomon Bio Technology Co., Ltd. focuses on the PGRs, such as gibberellin, S-ABA, bacillus, etc.; while Lomon Agricultural Technology Courtyard serves the end users, teaching farmers how to reasonably and efficiently use our fertilizers and regulators.
Our company has always paid attention to the effect of products and market reactions. Besides establishing many agricultural technology courtyard stations in Southwest China, our company has also set up the Lomon research institute in Sichuan and our own experimental fields. According to the market feedback, our PGRs, regardless of being used separately or together with fertilizers or other preparations, have achieved remarkable effects on cash crops, such as orange, grape, apple, and others.
Q5: Can you outline the main challenges in the current PGR market, your expectation on the future of Lomon, and the confidence that you want to convey to your global partners?
Currently, our company mainly faces the following challenges in the PGR market: 1. Limited demand for PGRs due to the higher technical requirements of PGRs on time, concentration, location and usage, the current development stage of PGRs, popularity in farming, especially at home, and small markets; 2. Fierce market competition due to domestic rivals possessing the same PGR batch number and their abundant sales channels; 3. Few new PGRs which may be produced by our company; our PGRs do not have obvious price advantages due to the restriction in production technology and high production costs.
PGRs are of great significance to the zero growth of pesticide usage and green development of agriculture due to its low costs, rapid effect with small amounts used, high input-output ratio, its unique and irreplaceable role, and its great potential. In agricultural production, the scientific, reasonable, correct and standard use of PGRs has gradually become a clear sign of evaluating the precision degree that farmers master the cultivation technology. In view of the promotion of PGRs at home in recent years, the PGR market is expanding, which offers a good opportunity for our company. Moreover, our company has been creating continuous innovations, improving its production technology, reducing production costs, and developing new varieties to provide more advantages in the future PGR market competition.
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