ZymoChem is Now a Public Benefit Corporation

The biotech leader formalizes its commitment to improving the environmental impact of product manufacturing.

SAN LEANDRO, CA, August 5, 2024 – ZymoChem, the biotech company dedicated to creating sustainable materials for everyday products, is proud to announce its newly ratified designation as a Public Benefit Corporation (PBC). By proactively amending its incorporation documents, ZymoChem formalizes its commitment to balancing profitability with social impact.

What is a Public Benefit Corporation?

Most companies in the United States follow language stemming from their initial incorporating bylaws to generate profits and create value for their shareholders. Given this implicit language, a company’s directors and executives are legally obligated to prioritize profitability above all else.

Conversely, a PBC is a type of for-profit corporate entity that commits to making a positive impact on society, its workers, and/or the environment. PBCs remain for-profit entities that create value for their internal shareholders, while also providing a benefit to a broader set of stakeholders.

This designation allows businesses and those leading them to consider both profits and their social mission when making critical decisions.

What is ZymoChem’s Public Benefit?

ZymoChem is accelerating the transition to a real-zero economy, a marketplace that eliminates carbon emissions from the value chain, rather than relying on carbon credits or offsets.  

With renewable feedstocks and technologies like ZymoChem’s patented Carbon Conserving microbes, the company is catalyzing that real-zero economy with drop-in, bio-based solutions for everyday products.

ZymoChem’s public benefit is now crystallized within its incorporation documents. It states that the Corporation’s specific public benefits are to:

Improve the environmental impacts of product manufacturing, and thus have a positive effect on human and planetary health.

Having its mission intertwined within its incorporation documents aligns well with a core value of ZymoChem, which is to Scale Sustainably. Through its pragmatic approach to business development and as a steward of a greener future, ZymoChem seeks sustained growth in a thoughtful, repeatable, and productive way.

Scale Sustainably

We seek sustained growth in a thoughtful, repeatable and productive way.

“ZymoChem is intent on solving some of the world’s biggest environmental challenges using the efficiency of biomanufacturing and by creating materials fit for the 21st Century,” said Joe Giallanella, General Manager of Branded Products at ZymoChem.  “It is only fitting for us to demonstrate this commitment to all of our stakeholders with our designation as a Public Benefit Corporation.”

What does this mean for our organization?

The day-to-day operations will remain largely the same for ZymoChem as it creates value for its shareholders, which includes its current and former employees and its investors.  ZymoChem does so by creating biobased, biodegradable, and lower carbon footprint materials to power everyday products. 

By becoming a PBC, the company is outwardly demonstrating its commitment to human and planetary health, a tenet that has been held since its founding.  ZymoChem is excited for this next phase of its evolution as a leader in biomanufacturing and hopes that this new designation inspires others in the industry to push for a more sustainable future too.

To learn more about what drives the organization, please visit ZymoChem’s Culture & Values page found here.