Landec Corporation today received notice of allowance for two patents from the U.S. Patent Office, including one covering the polymer used in the company's Intellicoat(TM) seed coating products which are being commercialized for the first time this spring.

The company's proprietary seed coatings control seed germination timing and can extend crop planting windows. Coated inbred seed corn represents the first commercialization of Intellicoat products.

"This is a significant validation of our seed coating technology,'' said Gary T. Steele, chairman and chief executive officer of Landec. "We now have customers for Intellicoat that include leading seed companies and are optimistic about the future of this product line,'' he added.

"In addition, we are applying this proprietary technology for coating soybean seed targeted for the relay cropping of wheat and soybean and are now conducting field trials for this application,'' Steele stated. Relay cropping enables farmers to plant two crops on the same acreage in the same year, thus increasing financial returns.

The second patent covers Landec's Aeromark(TM) product line of thermoset modeling and design
compounds which are targeted to prototype and design applications in the automotive and aerospace markets. "We have been testing Aeromark products with several large European automotive companies. In addition to our patented temperature triggered catalysts, these new products represent a new platform of thermoset formulation technology which warranted additional patent coverage,'' Steele noted.

Landec Corporation designs, develops, manufactures and sells temperature-activated and other specialty polymer products for a variety of food, agricultural, industrial and medical applications. The company's temperature-activated polymer products are based on its proprietary Intelimer® polymers which differ from other polymers in that they can be customized to abruptly change their physical characteristics when heated or cooled through a pre-set temperature switch.

Company news release
N2670