Emery Oleochemicals LLC has earned the Certified Biobased Product Label granted by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) for six products from the company’s EMEROX^® range of renewable-based polyols.

Royal DSM has hired Atul Thakrar to head its Bio-based Products & Services unit.

At the beginning of May, the Chemistry of Advanced Materials council of the Top Sector Chemistry gave the green light for nine new projects in the Biobased Performance Materials (BPM) program. Wageningen UR Food & Biobased Research, together with 25 partners, will be focusing on materials made from plant-based raw materials.

Based on its recent analysis of the European plasticizers market, Frost & Sullivan has recognized chemical company Oxea with the 2014 European Non-Phthalate Plasticizers Product Leadership Award.

News outlet Biofuels Digest gave its Chemical of the Year award to bio-succinic acid, naming producers BioAmber and Reverdia.

The European Union has commissioned Wageningen University and Research center (Wageningen UR) Food & Biobased Research (FBR) institute to perform pre-normative research into standards for biobased products.

Acme-Hardesty Co. announced that a number of its distributed products now carry the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Certified Biobased Product Label, in support of the USDA BioPreferred^® program.

In addition to its production capacity of about 10,000 tonnes per year out of the Cassano, Italy, Biosuccinium™ plant, Reverdia announced at the European Forum for Industrial Biotechnology (EFIB) that it is now licensing Biosuccinium.

Virent has appointed Edgar Steenwinkel to be the company’s Vice President of Research and Development.

Following its recent acquisition of the U.S.-based biotechnology company Virdia, Stora Enso is investing €32 million in a demonstration and market development plant to be built in Raceland, Louisiana.