Origin Agritech Limited (NASDAQ: SEED) rose sharply after the company disclosed that Longhan Investment Management will purchase 1.40 million shares of common stock for $5.54 per share.
The Beijing-based Origin, an agriculture technology and rural e-commerce company, today announced that under this agreement, the aggregate purchase price will be $7.7 million.
As previously announced, Origin has entered a strategic cooperation agreement with Longhan, under which Origin and Longhan will work together to start the commercialization of Integrated Saline-Alkaline Land Reclamation technology in 2019, both in China and globally.
Origin and Longhan will integrate seed treatment, soil treatment technologies and seed breeding & biotechnology, as well as Origin's agricultural business platform.
With Longhan's investment into the Company's stock, both Origin and Longhan plan to speed up the strategic cooperation and the commercialization process for the ISALR technology.
Origin is China's leading agricultural technology and a rural social e-commerce company, expanding in mid-2018 from crop seed breeding and genetic improvement business to be a leading technology developer in new rural e-commerce platform and Blockchain technologies.
In crop seed biotechnologies, Origin Agritech's phytase corn was the first transgenic corn to receive the Bio-Safety Certificate from China's Ministry of Agriculture. Over the years, Origin has established a robust biotechnology seed pipeline including products with glyphosate tolerance and pest resistance traits.
Shares in SEED climbed 67 cents, or 9.6%, to $7.62, within a 52-week trading range of $4.99 to $15.89.
