Bluewater Bio To Acquire Water Innovate

Acquisition of Water Innovate - terms of agreement reached, expected completion in October

Bluewater Bio International, a global specialist in the treatment of wastewater, is pleased to announce that it has agreed terms for the acquisition of Water Innovate, a technology transfer spin-out from the world-renowned Cranfield University School of Water Sciences. It is expected that completion of the deal will take place in October.

Water Innovate has a number of near market products and an exciting R&D pipeline which Bluewater Bio plans to incorporate into its growing portfolio of advanced water treatment technologies. In particular, Water Innovate specialises in monitoring and modelling systems for wastewater treatment works, enabling operators to control key emissions such as odour and greenhouse gases, including nitrogen oxides, thereby helping to increase efficiency, aid compliance, reduce environmental impact and reduce costs.

Through the acquisition, Bluewater Bio will gain immediate access to Water Innovate's current range of products, already in successful demonstration trials with major global utilities including Severn Trent Plc in the UK:

• N-Tox: a toxicity monitoring system that provides early warning of plant failure
• ODOURsim: dynamic odour modelling software for wastewater systems to enable selection of the optimum solution
• A series of advanced processes including membrane, biological and catalytic technologies that remove pollutants from water and effluents contaminated with nitrates, phosphates, suspended solids, colour or high chemical oxygen-demand.

The acquisition includes a five year rolling agreement providing the Company with access to Cranfield's own ongoing R&D pipeline of advanced wastewater treatment technologies.

John Catling, Executive Chairman of Water Innovate, said "This is an excellent opportunity for Water Innovate. I am very pleased that the tremendous hard work and enthusiasm of our first class team has created a multi-product pipeline that is now ready to enter the market, boosted by the exciting international operations at Bluewater Bio."

Daniel Ishag, CEO of Bluewater Bio, commented: "This announcement marks a significant point in a pivotal year for Bluewater Bio during which we have continued our growth trajectory as a privately held company. Commercial interest in our proprietary HYBACS technology is growing but we have made no secret of our acquisitive plans. Once the acquisition is complete, we look forward to installing one of our SMART units for ongoing evaluation and demonstration at Cranfield, integrating Water Innovate's technologies and developing the second generation of our HYBACs system.

"Our trials with Severn Trent and Aqualia have successfully shown HYBACS's high performance on-the-ground in Europe, building on over 10 years of operation in Asia. The large body of evidence from operating plants in the field and independently verified results from these trials have helped us secure significant commercial interest in the USA and high level political and commercial progress in China. We look forward to cementing those activities before the end of 2010 and to replicating our model into India and other areas of the globe faced by water scarcity, security and safety concerns."

About Bluewater Bio International
Bluewater Bio International is the holding company of a group of companies which have developed a cost effective advanced biological solution for the treatment of wastewater. Bluewater Bio is involved at all stages of the process from plant design and costing through to installation, commissioning and training and, when required, the provision of ongoing operation and maintenance. The proprietary technology, called HYBACS (Hybrid Bacillus Activated Sludge), is gaining acceptance among a growing number of companies both in Europe and the Middle East and Asia to be commercially superior to many existing treatment processes worldwide, across a wide range of treatment requirements. Bluewater Bio's strategy is to focus on selling HYBACS technology to both the municipal treatment sector and to industrial customers and polluters of water. This strategy aims to present customers with cost-effective HYBACS-based treatment and to offer solutions which provide the immediate treatment, capital cost benefits, wastewater reuse potential and also the lifetime operational expenditure benefits of the HYBACS process.

Bluewater Bio's growing product offering addresses municipal and industrial wastewater treatment and reuse requirements associated with:

• municipal and domestic wastewater from cities and residential developments;
• upgrading existing sewage treatment plants to meet stricter regulations and legislation;
• monitoring and reducing greenhouse gas emissions;
• wastewater reuse, providing high quality treated effluent for use in agriculture, irrigation, landscaping, and ‘greening' initiatives where there is water scarcity, such as the Middle East;
• beverage wastewater from brewers and drink manufacturers;
• food processing wastewater, for example effluent from an abattoir or confectionary plant; and leachate wastewater from landfill sites.

HYBACS is also able to treat efficiently a much wider range of organic industrial wastewaters, including highly concentrated livestock wastewater and the effluent from, among others, textile manufacturers, hospitals and factories.

The HYBACS system is applicable to new and existing works, over a wide range of scale, and has been proven commercially in over 25 applications.

The HYBACS process deploys a different biological approach to any commercially established wastewater treatment process. Through its design and operation, HYBACS biologically selects a particular group of bacteria capable, when stimulated, of giving particularly high yields of different enzymes which are the work horses of wastewater treatment. This forms the foundation of the HYBACS process's ability to deliver wastewater treatment with superior performance over competing technologies in a number of key areas.

For more information, visit www.bluewaterbio.com.

About Water Innovate
Water Innovate's focus is on commercialising the technologies developed with the School of Water Sciences at Cranfield University and taking them to market either directly or through licensing deals. The Company's vision is to break new ground by providing an effective conduit for the transfer of new technologies out of the laboratory and into the industry, bridging the innovation gap that has existed in the sector for far too long.

The Company is now investing significant resources in further development of additional technologies, as well as in evaluating opportunities to acquire additional portfolios of water related technology from various sources to bring to market.

SOURCE: Bluewater Bio International