Leading AI companies in Europe join forces

On December 1st, 2020, Evolution, Masterrind and VikingGenetics (owned by Faba, Växa and Vikingdanmark) establish a new dairy and beef genetic cooperative Arcowin representing 53,000 farmers in Europe. The new cooperative will work on ensuring the most sustainable and the highest possible genetic progress, to the benefit of the members and customers worldwide.

Evolution, Masterrind and VikingGenetics are leading cooperatives within cattle breeding with strong bases in Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, and Sweden. All three cooperatives have been pioneers in driving progress and profitability of the dairy and beef industry, not only in their home markets, but also around the world.

From 1st of January 2021, Arcowin will support dairy and beef breeding programs from Evolution, Masterrind, VikingGenetics, with the main objective to ensure the highest possible genetic progress.

‘We believe that by combining the ambitions, the expertise and the obligation to support the dairy and beef industry, the road is set for Arcowin to be able to play a key role in developing the industry for the future, which could include additional partners to join. The three organizations will use Arcowin to get better usage of their genetic resources and investments,’ says Mr. Lars-Inge Gunnarsson, Chairperson of the board for VikingGenetics.

Arcowin will implement a full exchange of genetic information across all breeds and countries. The new cooperative will be able to identify the best animals, and thereby to maximize the genetic gain in all the breeding programs organized by the Arcowin partners. The dairy genetics will still be evaluated and marketed on the existing bases.

‘The three founding partners of Arcowin have a long history of investing significant resources into R&D, to ensure a continued strong development of their breeding programs, production and services. Going forward Arcowin, will coordinate and align the R&D activities between the three founding partners, for eliminating parallel work and to share the resulting benefits with members and customers,’ says Dr Josef Pott, CEO Arcowin.

The three founding partners will keep operating separately in administration, production, marketing and sales, and agree to investigate further synergies of collaboration.

For more information, please contact Henrik Biilmann, CEO VikingGenetics on mail: hebii@vikinggenetics.com, Tel +45 2383 8788.

Lars-Inge Gunnarsson,
Chairman, Vikinggenetics

Jörg Stubbemann
Chairman, Masterrind

Vincent Retif
Chairman, Evolution

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Quotes

‘We are here to provide the world’s best science-based genetic products and solutions for the progressive cattle farmers. Being a farmer owned cooperative; we are obligated to support the long-term sustainability of cattle farmers.’ says Lars-Inge Gunnarsson, Chairman at VikingGenetics
‘The three founding cooperatives are a perfect match, as we complement each other. VikingGenetics brings three major breeds, VikingHolstein, VikingJersey and VikingRed, and extensive experience in dairy cross breeding into Arcowin. Masterrind is the leader in Germany in new technologies, as one of the first it is leading in genomic selection. And Evolution, ends the circle bringing a full range of dairy and beef breeds adapted to each kind of environment worldwide as well as genetic innovations which fit the farmers needs and leads to farmers benefit.’ says Jörg Stubbemann, Chairman at Masterrind
‘Our passion is to help farmers achieve their business goals, farm sustainably, and enjoy life. This is achieved by our breeding solutions that are based on the farmer’s needs, science and data and experienced people’ says Vincent Retif, Chairman at Evolution
‘We are here to help feed the world’s expanding population and sustain the earth’s natural resources through breeding of efficient, healthy and trouble-free cow. Providing best in class genetic solutions, by combining the strongest breeding programs in Europe’ says Lars-Inge Gunnarsson, Chairman at VikingGenetics
‘We are a cooperative with 53,000 members. We are here to help the farmers to obtain some of their goals. Get the newer ending workload done. Being able to spend time with family and to fulfil financial goals.’ Jörg Stubbemann, Chairman at Masterrind
‘The farmers seek breeding solutions, that helps them achieving their business objectives, and we are here to help them’ says Lars-Inge Gunnarsson, Chairman at VikingGenetics

About the three founding partners

EVOLUTION
A major player in French and European bovine genetics, present on strategic world markets, Evolution is also the world's leading insemination service cooperative with more than 12,000 inseminations per day.
Genetic creation and services to breeders are our core businesses and lead us to work with 28,000 French breeders on a daily basis. Evolution combines the development and distribution of excellent genetics, adapted to the different breeding and product development contexts, with global support for herd reproduction and renewal. We focus our strategy on analysing and anticipating the needs of our members, breeders and customers, for a dynamic of innovation at the service of the sustainable performance of livestock farms.
Faithful to its co-operative nature, Evolution’s main aim is to guide and support farmers to contribute, together to nutritional and environmental challenges at worldwide level and to ensure the continued existence of the company and livestock farms for future generations.
See more on www.evolution-xy.fr

MASTERRIND
Achieving the best together - at home and around the world.
Masterrind is one of the leading cattle breeding organizations in Europe. Science-based knowledge and practical experience gained over generations in more than 100 years provide both bovine genetic products and suitable and innovative services for successful dairy and beef farmers. A fair and professional partnership is the basis for the cooperation with our members and customers. More than 8,500 farmers in different German regions are owning the membership-structured enterprise. These breeders are keeping around 600,000 registered dairy and 12,000 beef cows. Masterrind breeders keep by far the largest population of registered Holstein cows in Germany.
Driven by innovation, traditional values and sustainability Masterrind combines advanced technology and proven procedures to supply genetics that offers productive but healthy cows. Various service tools round off the supply of suitable solutions for the farmers through the use of 600 employees in the several business areas. For example, more than 1.6 million insemination services are carried out annually for farmers in the home markets, while Masterrind also cooperates with customers and farmers in more than 50 countries worldwide.
Masterrind focus is to support the farmers to gain additional value. Due to this strategy the company has accomplished the German market leadership by achieving the best together.
See more on www.masterrind.com/en

VikingGenetics
VikingGenetics help feed the world’s expanding population and sustain the earth’s natural resources by breeding healthy, efficient, trouble-free cows. VikingGenetics provide science-based bovine genetic products and solutions for progressive dairy and beef producers around the world. As a co-operative, VikingGenetics is owned by 19,000 dairy and beef farmers in Denmark, Sweden, and Finland. The unique combination of breeding for health traits as well as production has led to a position as domestic market leader in the Nordic countries and strong player globally.
VikingGenetics´ passion is to help farmers achieve their business goals, farm sustainably, and enjoy life. The company employ 155 people.
See more on www.vikinggenetics.com