NaturalShrimp, which claims to have developed and patented the first commercially operational recirculating aquaculture system for shrimp, has formally closed the acquisition of the assets of F&T Water Solutions, including the patents on the company’s "electro-coagulation system", as well as the associated equipment and processes.
Gerald Easterling, CEO of NaturalShrimp, commented: “This acquisition represents the final phase of our joint development of the electro-coagulation (EC) technology begun by F&T Water Solutions and its former president Peter Letizia. We now own and control this EC technology as it relates to all aquaculture species and applications. We plan to utilize this technology in all of our shrimp growing operations and to license to other aquaculture ventures worldwide.”
Tom Untermeyer, chief technology officer of NaturalShrimp, commented: “Working with F&T on this EC technology has been a rewarding adventure. With the system upgrades developed over the last several years, NaturalShrimp now has the most technologically and robust advanced aquaculture system currently in operation in the world.”
The acquisition comes at a busy time for NaturalShrimp, which revealed that it had secured $13.5 million in funding last week. Yesterday it began transferring juveniles from its nursery facility to its grow-out tanks.
The shrimp nursery is located in Blairsburg, Iowa and contains 120 500-gallon tanks, of which 20 were stocked with post-larvae (PL) shrimp. The PLs were successfully trucked from the Blairsburg plant approximately 20 miles to the Webster City, Iowa plant. The Webster City plant contains 240 10,000-gallon grow-out tanks, of which six were stocked with the PLs.
“This transfer was significant as it proved out the company’s production plans around utilization of the three facilities in the Iowa triangle. The smaller nursery tanks provide a more controlled environment for acclimating the initial PL shrimp to the facility’s water temperature and salinity while still providing enough volume for the smaller shrimp to grow,” the said company in a press release.
