Bioprime AgriSolutions begins exporting biofertilizer, biocontrol products

Pune-based biotech start-up Bioprime AgriSolutions Pvt Ltd has begun exporting its biofertilizer and biocontrol products to the US and South-East Asia, the company’s co-founder, Renuka Diwan, has said.

“We have got our products registered in some countries of South-East Asia. We also have partnerships and have begun our work there. We have our products registered in the US also. Exports have started. We have solid plans to enter several other regions the next (financial) year,” she told businessline in an online interview.

Bioprime will focus on Europe and other markets, such as Latin America, in the next fiscal year. In 2026, Bioprime plans to commercialise its anti-fungal product to tackle downy and powdery mildew in grapes and vegetables. 

Cutting fertilizer use

The startup, launched in 2016, carried out pilot projects in a few States such as Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra and has begun commercialising them. 

“We are building a use case for bananas. We have demonstration plots in Ghargaon, Maharashtra. We are conducting trials along with the Tea Research Institute in Assam for the product efficacy in tea,” she said. 

Bioprime — which has three baskets of products that can make crops stress-tolerant, climate-resilient and reduce fertilizer requirements — has launched its first Trichoderma-based product,  Trichonexus. It has been evaluated against 12 fungal pathogens. Picked for its preventive and curative efficiency, it has been obtained from Bionexus, the company’s library on the plant-associated microbes.

The startup plans to commercialise another product, Nutrimax, a molecule-based product as a fertiliser additive or a fertiliser coating. “The product was launched after two years of analysis, which the company carried out with the Rice Research Institute. The fertilizer use has been reduced by 25-50 per cent. 

Evaluating microbes

“We not only saw better growth with reduced fertilizers, but nutrient uptake and storage in the produce were higher,” said Diwan, adding that the company has developed NPK (nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium) and speciality blends. 

In the past two years, Bioprime has commercialised biofertilizer products for mineral mobilisation after carrying out research on microbes from its library. 

Bioprime has developed methodologies to evaluate the potential of the microbes to release nutrients from the soil, such as phosphate, calcium, aluminium and iron, and zero in on selected strains that could work in all conditions, said Diwan.

As a result, the company commercialised its phosphate-solubilising bacteria and has got good results. It has tied up with Israel Chemicals Limited, which will commercialise the product across India. 

NPK efficacy in soil

“Our microbes get assayed, like how much phosphate can be liberated and which is bound to calcium. In our soils, a large portion is associated with aluminium and iron, other than calcium, which is something unique,” she said.

Similarly, Bioprime has prepared strains for zinc solubilisation, which is seven- to eight-fold higher compared to the ones available in the market. The company has been able to obtain such strains because of the high-throughput screening. This has helped it develop an entire range of biofertilizers.

The startup also has products with nitrogen-fixing, potassium solubilising and zinc solubilising microbes, completing its portfolio in the biofertilizer side. 

Diwan said after two years of research, the company has been able to see efficiency in the use of NPK in the soil. The more intake of NPK by the plant, the more it is stored in the grain.

Huge potential 

“We also found that iron and zinc uptake also increased, and soil organic carbon increased almost 18 per cent after every harvest. That’s kind of the product we are starting to commercialise. This can be coated on top of fertilisers; it can be integrated into liquid fertilisers as an additive; and can be co-applied with the fertilisers also,” she said.

The company sees a huge potential in these products, especially since the nutrient use efficiency is about 20 per cent only. Plus, the centre gives a huge subsidy based on the nutrient use efficiency.  

Over the past two years, Bioprime’s collection of micro-organisms in its Bionexus library has expanded to 100 more locations, with over 18,000 plant-associated microbes being detected. 

It is from these, Diwan said, that the company has come up with its NPK solubilising products. Almost 35 different aspects of the microbes are assayed by Bioprime to help understand their role in the soil and plants health. It also examines their role as a biocontrol, which means any anti-fungal or insecticidal property.   

The firm’s co-founder said it has developed an assay to test different functionalities rapidly and has been able to shortlist 172 microbes from the 18,000 microbes collected from biodiversity hotspots.  

Bionexus has a database on the abilities of the microbes found through research and development.  For molecular discovery, the company has a platform called Sniper.   

These molecules can come from plants, microbes, algae and fungi, anything. “We basically focus on functional molecules that the plants or the microbes kind of produce. These are called secondary metabolites, and our biostimulant range is built or based on the Sniper platform,” said Diwan.

Belgium investment

Bioprime works with about 1.7 lakh farmers in limited geographies such as Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Guntur (Andhra Pradesh) and parts of Karnataka. The company commercialises its products through its own network besides tie-ups with large companies such as DCM Shriram, Insecticide India and Yara India among others.

These companies also market Bioprime products, and in certain cases, it forms a partnership on product discovery. The company was launched during an El Niño year, 2016. With three years of La Niña following El Niño and again an El Niño in 2023, it took advantage of the situation in western Maharashtra. 

 “The heat spikes were foretold. And farmers took the risk of planting brinjals, tomatoes, etc., the same as in  2016. But with the company’s products for stress management and growth, the farmers got record yields,” the company’s co-founder said. 

 The company’s products are now being adopted in western Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh, while its chilli segment is favoured in Guntur. 

Bioprime, which grew by 3X last fiscal, expects to grow 2X this fiscal as there is a new registration process for biostimulants now. The process has changed with the Centre now providing permanent registration. “The changeover is taking time,” said Diwan.

Belgian investor Edaphon funded the company last year. Besides, it has got funds from Omnivore, said the co-founder of Bioprime.  

Published on January 8, 2026