AquaBounty Technologies

The underlying genetic technology that accelerates the growth and reduces the time to market for the AquAdvantage salmon was developed in 1989 at Memorial University in Newfoundland, Canada. In 2003, the first regulatory study of the fish was submitted in the U.S. to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), who ruled that the fish were safe to eat and posed no threat to the environment when farmed in land-based aquaculture farms. In 2012, a submission was made to Health Canada to allow the sale of the genetically modified fish in Canada and the application was subsequently approved. AquAdvantage salmon received FDA approval in 2015 and the first U.S. harvest of salmon occurred in 2020 at their aquafarm in Albany, Indiana.

On April 20, 2022, construction began on a 479,000 sq ft (44,500 m2) production facility in Pioneer, Ohio, which could produce over 22 million pounds of genetically engineered Atlantic salmon per year. The project was expected to cost $290–320 million.

On June 2, 2023, AquaBounty announced that construction of the Pioneer farm had been paused due to an unexpected increase in construction costs, bringing the new estimate to $375–395 million.

On November 7, 2023, AquaBounty announced that construction costs for the Pioneer farm had risen to $485–495 million. The company also entered into a non-binding memorandum of understanding with Noble Salmon to build and operate a recirculating aquaculture system (RAS) salmon farm in the Republic of Georgia.

On February 14, 2024, the company announced that it would sell its Indiana farm in order to continue funding the new Pioneer farm, which was now 30 percent completed. The sale was completed by July for $9.2 million.

In April 2024, AquaBounty obtained a $10 million short-term loan, maturing on July 31, 2024.

On June 7, 2024, David F. Melbourne Jr. became president and CEO of AquaBounty with the previous CEO, Sylvia Wulf, becoming board chair of the board of directors.

On September 3, 2024, the company announced that it would sell its farm in Rollo Bay, Prince Edward Island.

The company has developed hybrid salmon, trout, and tilapia designed to grow faster than traditional fish. Only the salmon has progressed to government (Canada, United States) approvals and are the first genetically modified animals approved for consumption. Their hybrid Atlantic salmon incorporates a gene from a Chinook salmon, which bears a single copy of the stably integrated α-form of the opAFP-GHc2 gene construct at the α-locus in the EO-1α line (Ocean Pout AKA Eel). AquaBounty has patented and trademarked this fish as the AquAdvantage salmon, a sterile Atlantic salmon female that can grow to market size in half the time of conventional salmon.

The company was reported to have made its first sale of 4.5 metric tons (4.4 long tons; 5.0 short tons) of AquaAdvantage salmon to Canadian customers in July 2017. Sales in the U.S. started May 2021.