Intellectual Ventures® (IV®) announced the formation of, and ongoing collaboration with CF Global Holdings, Inc. (CF Global), manufacturer of Coffee Flour™, a new, sustainable food ingredient derived from coffee cherries to fortify wheat, corn, soy and other commodity flours. Coffee Flour’s inventor, Dan Belliveau, worked closely with Intellectual Ventures over the past two years to develop CF Global’s overall intellectual property strategy and the technical process of converting the coffee cherry pulp into nutritious, gluten-free flour. Intellectual Ventures is also providing financial and technical support for scientific testing and product development of Coffee Flour.
As an investor and collaborator, Intellectual Ventures will help Coffee Flour Global with business introductions and assist with licensing negotiations in the global food and beverage industry.
“Our relationship with Intellectual Ventures, and the intellectual property strategy they implemented around our technology, has been instrumental to the formation and growth of CF Global,” said Dan Belliveau, inventor, founder and chief executive officer of CF Global, in a prepared statement. “As we move forward, we’ll continue to work closely with Intellectual Ventures to make our vision for Coffee Flour – one we feel will change the course of coffee history – a reality.”
CF Global’s business model is structured to create a new revenue source for farmers, pickers and mills while reducing the environmental impact of green coffee production. Until today, coffee cherry pulp has been an unvalued byproduct resulting from the 17 billion pounds of coffee beans harvested around the world each year. Coffee Flour is produced by drying and milling the previously unvalued coffee cherry pulp, thereby creating a new and sustainable source of revenue for small-scale coffee farmers worldwide.
“Intellectual Ventures has a long history of investing in invention and working with inventors like Dan Belliveau to improve, patent, and commercialize their inventions. We believe Coffee Flour has tremendous promise,” said Ken Poppe, U.S. country head for the Invention Development Fund (IDF) at Intellectual Ventures. “This idea has the potential to drive significant value for nearly every facet of the supply chain – from farm to table.”
Intellectual Ventures is joined in its collaboration with CF Global Holdings, Inc. by several other entities, including NohBell Corp., and two of the global coffee industry’s leading companies ECOM Agroindustrial Corp. Ltd., and Mercon Coffee Corp.
