As a way to become more visible to customers, Novus International Inc.’s research facility at the Missouri Research Park held an open house on Monday and Tuesday for members of the Federation of Animal Science Societies.
Novus opened its typically sealed doors to the public this week because it wants to begin handling the distribution of its animal feed supplement products, said Chris Knight, head of research and development. About 600 members of the American Dairy Science Association, the American Society of Animal Science and the Poultry Science Association came to the Missouri Research Park in busloads to tour the 30,000-square-foot laboratory, mingled with staff and learned a lot about methionine hydroxyl analogue supplementation, the key ingredient to the company’s feed supplementation products.
The animal societies were in St. Louis for an annual convention and FASS presentation during the week.
In the past few years, Novus has begun to diversify its products and directly distribute to its clients, Knight said.
Novus has been manufacturing nutritional supplements in animal feed since the 1950s when it was still a part of St. Louis-based Monsanto Co. Novus became an independent company in 1991, when Monsanto sold Novus to two Japanese companies, Mitsui & Co. and Nippon Soda Co. By then, the company had established its Alimet food supplement product in the poultry industry. Alimet, a liquid MHA supplement, is a more efficient way to enhance the strength and growth of livestock that is processed for human consumption.
In recent years, the company has expanded into other livestock markets, such as the swine, sheep, cattle and dairy markets. Novus is considered to be the leading authority on understanding the harmful metabolic effects of feeding unstabilized feed ingredients to animals. Just last year, Novus became the worldview distributor for Solutia Inc.’s Santoquin feed preservative.
With clients such as Tyson Foods Inc., Land O Lakes Inc. and a multitude of other national and international feed manufacturers, broilers and farms. Novus does an average in sales each year, Knight said.
The Novus research facility at the Missouri Research Park was built in 1994. It runs with a staff of 28 professionals who specialize in disciplines such as chemistry, biology, histology and veterinary medicine. Worldwide, the company has 180 employees. Its world headquarters is in Maryville Centre in St. Louis.
While Novus had its origins in animal feed ingredients, its future goals include bringing innovations to the animal agriculture industry through laboratory research, practical field studies and customer interaction.
In addition to the open house, Novus staff celebrated the 20th anniversary of its Alimet manufacturing plant in Texas, the Chocolate Bayou Alimet Plant. The plant was built with the capacity to produce 100 million pounds of Alimet per year. In 2000, the plant exceeded 3 billion pounds total production of the supplement.
The back yard of the Novus building at 20 Missouri Research Park Drive was set up for the open house with tents, refreshments and musical entertainment.
