Startup sells biofuel sugar


Corvallis biofuel startup Trillium FiberFuels has launched a side business to provide xylose, a sugar contained in biomass.

Share this article!

Corvallis biofuel startup Trillium FiberFuels has launched a side business to provide xylose, a sugar contained in biomass.

The new business provides xylose and other carbohydrates at a much lower price than available from a chemical company.

Cascade Analytical Reagents and Biochemicals is a web-based business intended to serve researchers working on advanced development of biofuels and other products. To keep prices down, [Trillium president Chris] Beatty worked with suppliers to independently analyze and certify their chemical products for quality. By buying in bulk directly from a supplier, Beatty was able to reduce costs by 25 to 50 percent, depending on the product.

“The niche we see is people like us in the first stages of scale-up,” Beatty said. “We’ve already sold a few thousand orders just by word of mouth. Sugars are the basis for all living things, which makes them popular for all research. We saw an immediate opportunity to help people like ourselves, and to allow some growth.”

Read more at the Daily Journal of Commerce.

{biztweet}xylose{/biztweet}