January 26/Obesity, Fitness & Wellness Week -- NutraCea formed two joint ventures with HerbalScience Singapore Ltd Pte, a company that produces standardized botanical extracts for functional food and nutraceutical uses, and identifies novel chemistries for drug development through the application of its proprietary platform technology. The parties will establish two companies, one for nutraceutical products and functional food ingredient development from SRB and one for drug discovery from SRB.

Under the terms of the agreements, NutraCea will have an 80% interest in Rice Science, a newly formed limited liability company that will develop certain extracts targeted for specific health conditions. Rice Science has identified three specific areas of health that it will pursue: Diabetes, Arthritis and Immunity. The second newly formed company, Rice Rx, will be a limited liability company owned 50/50 by HerbalScience and NutraCea. It will advance drug discovery from SRB for licensing to life science and pharmaceutical companies.

Brad Edson, chief executive officer of NutraCea commented, "Our ongoing clinical research continues to validate our beliefs regarding the inherent value of our proprietary products for various applications related to certain disease specific states such as joint health, immune response, diabetes, cardiovascular disease and more. We know that stabilized rice bran contains a rich bounty of natural compounds at therapeutic levels. We believe by isolating these specific elements, we can create quantifiable isolates that have the potential to be measurably effective in dealing with some of the most serious health threats that we face today. Additionally, many botanicals have been the basis for pharmaceutical drugs."

Robert Gow, chairman and CEO of HerbalScience said, "We are pleased to partner with the world leader in stabilized rice bran technologies. Together with NutraCea, we feel we can develop proprietary and efficacious extracts from their stabilized rice bran that have clearly defined health and wellness benefits for use in foods and consumer products, and identify patentable chemistries that have the potential to be turned into drugs for the pharmaceutical industry."

From the January 21, 2008, Prepared Foods e-Flash