About Bench Bio
About Bench Bio
Bench Bio Private Limited (BenchBio) is a privately held Indian start-up company with strong European links providing biotechnology solutions to the agricultural sector worldwide. BenchBio is located at Vapi (Gujarat) near Mumbai and is focusing on discovering important traits in plants both for agricultural and consumer value. BenchBio is creating, as well as discovering, alleles using a non-transgenic (non-GM) method known as “Allele Discovery Platform (ADP)” a development of the TILLING and Eco-TILLING methods.
Our ADP method is based upon the Crop Functional Genomics group of INRA/URGV at Evry (France) developed by Dr. Abdelhafid Bendahmane (Triques et al., 2007, Plant J., 51(6):1116-25 ; Triques et al., 2008, BMC Molecular Biology 9:42). Dr Bendahmane serves as scientific advisor to Bench Bio.
BenchBio owns a license on patent and know-how from INRA-Transfert and GENOPLANTE-VALOR to use this technology.
BenchBio makes use of the large amount of freely available DNA sequence information for a wide range of crops. BenchBio does reverse genetics and works with an organisms’ own genome (DNA) and is therefore non-transgenic (no foreign DNA added). There is significant advantage of this method; it is consumer friendly and most importantly the cost and time to develop new varieties is reduced significantly because regulatory hurdles are non-existent.
The company’s advanced biotechnology laboratory facilities are Department of Scientific and Industrial Research (DSIR), Ministry of Science & Technology, Government of India recognised. The laboratory facilities are complemented by extensive field work capacity. BenchBio has temperature controlled glasshouses including a state of the art air conditioned glasshouse. These facilities enable BenchBio to satisfy precisely the climatic requirements for a very wide range of world crops. BenchBio has strengths in bioinformatics, molecular biology, plant biochemistry and plant breeding. In addition, the company has unique access to a network of outstanding scientists, plant breeders and business advisors throughout India and Europe.