AquaBounty Technologies’ former CEO Ron Stotish has announced he will not run for reelection to his board position at the company’s annual shareholders meeting on 30 April, 2019.
Stotish moved into the position of executive director at the Maynard, Massachusetts-based AquaBounty when Sylvia Wulf took on the CEO role in January. His last day at AquaBounty will be 30 June, 2019, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
Stotish, 69, worked for AquaBounty for 13 years, leading the company’s successful efforts to persuade Canadian and U.S. authorities to approve the import and sale of AquAdvantage Salmon, which has been genetically engineered to grow faster using genes from ocean pout and Chinook salmon added into Atlantic salmon eggs via micro-injection. Health Canada declared the product safe for consumption and allowed its sale to Canadian consumers in May 2016 and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration gave its final clearance – for importing genetically engineered salmon eggs from Canada – earlier this month.
Fresh off its regulatory victories, AquaBounty hosted U.S. Senator Todd Young (R-Indiana) for a tour of its Albany, Indiana production facility on Thursday, 21 March. In an interview during the tour, Young told the Star Press he backed the company’s efforts to expand in Indiana and obtain regulatory approval for two additional products – bioengineered rainbow trout and gene-edited tilapia. Young said consumer resistance to genetically engineered seafood will subside once the public becomes better educated that the fish are healthy to eat.
"This is a job creator, a wealth creator, for the people of Indiana,” he said. “This is a growing area of Indiana's agribusiness portfolio and I expect it to really take off here in the future with this FDA approval of genetically enhanced salmon. Now we literally have an opportunity to feed millions, perhaps billions, of people in the future."
U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filings from earlier this year show the company is pursuing additional regulatory approval for AquAdvantage Salmon in Brazil, Argentina, Chile, China, and Israel.
In a separate announcement on 21 March, AquaBounty announced it raised an estimated USD 7.5 million (EUR 6.7 million) by offering 3,345,282 shares of common stock at USD 2.25 (EUR 2.01) per share. AquaBounty also granted its underwriters a 45-day option to purchase an additional 501,792 shares of its common stock at the public offering price per share.
Photo courtesy of Office of U.S. Senator Todd Young
