Scaling sustainability and planting the seeds for long-term growth

GMOs can be a force for good. That’s the drive behind Neoplants, the first company in the world to bioengineer plants that purify the air, according to Co-founder and CTO, Patrick Torbey. 

Torbey has long been fascinated by the power of genetic engineering. His frustration, though, lies in the fact that these tools were often missing the range of possibilities, absent from applications that positively impact people’s lives. Upon meeting co-founder and CEO, Lionel Mora, an idea was born: using nature as a source of innovation and technology. Based on the belief that nature is the most powerful piece of technology available, Neoplants was started in 2019, with a mission of building a greener future.

Plants are a common organism lining the walls of most homes and offices, taking in carbon dioxide and releasing oxygen. But what if plants could absorb things that are harmful for humans? This question is exactly what led Neoplants to their first product, Neo Px, the first and only Plant-Microbiome System reengineered to metabolize these harmful chemical compounds. In comparison to a regular house plant, Neoplants’ product is the equivalent of up to 30 plants, bringing massive efficiencies to air purification. 

With more products to come, Neoplants is part of a broader community building with nature. Working with nature as technology, however, calls for a large amount of genetic engineering, synthetic biology, and a lot of different moving parts that require integration. To achieve such coordination, Neoplants needed a solution that would be adopted by a diverse array of teams. We recently sat down with the co-founders to talk about their mission, and how Benchling is supporting their long-term growth plan. Here are some of our biggest takeaways.

1. Data management is a critical lever for growth.

Neoplants’ data management strategy has been central to the company’s ability to scale. But this strategy has evolved just as much as the company has. Starting with Google sheets, Neoplants initially had modest needs when it came to data, opting for a solution that mirrored their data’s complexity. As the team grew, however, they began hitting limitations, facing challenges with data storage, automation, and data connectivity. 

Once the team at Neoplants began to expand more rapidly, it was clear a new solution was necessary to improve communication. “We benchmarked a lot of different solutions. One of the solutions we started using was a competitor of Benchling, but it was super heavy to put in place, and we weren’t very happy about it; we started using Benchling two years ago,” shares Patrick. “Once everything is in there, it becomes very smooth and very easy to understand who is working on what.” With the ability to connect the entire organization on one platform, R&D has become increasingly efficient, synergizing the many different fields. 

The team at Neoplants is diverse, composed of bioinformaticians, plant scientists, microbiologists, and engineers who work with plants and microorganisms. While the company does not currently employ data scientists, good data management with Benchling is what allows them to scale. Despite different levels of tech savviness among these roles, quick time to value resulted in successful, swift adoption across the organization.

“Formatting data and having reports that are the same format is impossible if you’re not using a certain tool like Benchling. Benchling forces everyone to use the same language and format, making communication much easier. You can really go the distance with it and scale.”

- Patrick Torbey, Co-founder and CTO, Neoplants

2. Building and designing DNA and plants requires a good tracing process.

One of Neoplants’ primary use cases for Benchling is building DNA constructs. Building DNA requires teams to look at sequences, promoters, genes, and terminators, exploring how they can be put together to build synthetic metabolic pathways. These pathways are then inserted inside the plants, whether it is to purify the air, or for future applications. 

The plants team, according to Patrick, uses Benchling to track everything they do, making it much easier to trace the different plant lines. Once DNA is designed, it is transferred to the platform, centralizing all of the plasmids on Benchling, where a small team builds over 100 different plasmids every week. Once plasmids are built, they are tested in transit form, completing the process of agro infiltration to identify if they are producing the desired compounds, amongst other criteria. 

Arriving at a shortlist of which pathways work well, the team at Neoplants carries out stable end transformation, inserting the DNA inside the genome of the plants to start the individual culture process. This process, from inserting DNA, to plant embryos, to mature plants, takes about 9 to 12 months. Being able to trace every one of those entities is critical for Neoplants, a process that caused roadblocks before the adoption of Benchling. “We didn’t push the team to have a good tracing process; we would have to go to spreadsheets and directly to scientists. Benchling enables people to have a format and process for tracing”, shared Torbey. With the introduction of a structured, universal process, building and designing DNA has become more efficient and accurate.

3. Internal visibility accelerates R&D.

On a given day, Neoplants is actively working on more than 1,000 different plasmids and plants. This multitude of projects is spread across multiple teams and disciplines, making it challenging to keep track of what everyone is working on at a given time. While everyone has a personal notebook, checking each one individually is incredibly time-consuming, slowing down progress. 

With Benchling, instead of manually checking each notebook, team members can push a report on a specific project, gaining real-time insight. Partnering with the Benchling Implementation Team, Neoplants built a unique and complex data model, one that ‌laid the foundation for accessing the necessary properties for each entity. “I'm pushing it heavily internally, because the insights that you have are also very valuable for me. How many transformations did we do this month? What is the growth rate of these plants? How many different lines do we have? For all of these things, I don't even have to ask people. It gives you a snapshot of what's moving between teams and what's being worked on,” Torbey explains. By gaining an immediate view of projects and status, the entire organization can move faster, accelerating their mission of building a greener future.

“This is the best tool. We’ve done our homework, and this is the best tool.”

- Patrick Torbey, Co-founder and CTO, Neoplants

Solving climate change one plant at a time

Headquartered in Paris, Neoplants has reached several impressive milestones already, launching its first product while expanding to the United States. Neoplants’ product line is expected to evolve with the introduction of new microorganisms and aesthetically pleasing, high-performing air-purifying plants. Fueled by the goal of addressing the biggest problem, climate change, the team at Neoplants is primed to scale sustainability with an effective data management strategy, a strong data-tracing process, and improved visibility.