Atlanta, IN (March 2, 2025) – Beck’s announced the acquisition of Gro Alliance’s corn seed production facility in Howe, Indiana, and its soybean seed production and corn drying facilities in Mt. Pulaski, Illinois.
This strategic acquisition reinforces Beck’s commitment to providing high-quality seed and exceptional service to farmers across its growing marketing area.
The transaction closed on February 26.
“Gro Alliance is widely recognized as one of the nation’s top seed producers, and the teams and facilities at Howe and Mt. Pulaski are world-class,” says Scott Beck, president of Beck’s. “These acquisitions are a perfect fit for our network and represent an investment in our mission to deliver the best seed products to farmers with the service they deserve.”
In addition to acquiring the two seed production facilities, Beck’s has assumed Gro Alliance’s lease on 80,000 square feet of warehouse space in Sturgis, Michigan. These assets will strengthen Beck’s operational capacity, improving logistics and product availability.
This acquisition brings significant benefits to Beck’s, further strengthening their seed production and processing capabilities.
The company says the Howe location is ideally situated in a region well-suited for growing high-quality seed corn, ensuring access to premium seed production. Additionally, the locations of both Mt. Pulaski and Howe strategically complement Beck’s existing production and processing facilities, enhancing overall efficiency and logistics.
With these new facilities, Beck’s gains valuable additional capacity to produce and process seed, supporting the continued growth and ensuring Beck’s can meet the needs of customers with even greater reliability.
For more information about Beck’s products and services, visit www.beckshybrids.com.
Gro Alliance Strikes Asset Deal with Beck’s
The Deal Details
Gro Alliance will retain field production activities in the Howe, Indiana / Constantine, Michigan area. Seed grown there will be dried locally and moved to the Cuba City, Wisconsin headquarters for conditioning, packaging, and distribution.
Gro Alliance will retain its seed nursery station at its current location in Mt Pulaski, Illinois, soybean seed field production activities in the region, and John Endsley will remain with the company as its soybean division director.
In addition to acquiring the two seed production facilities, Beck’s will assume Gro Alliance’s lease on 80,000 square feet of warehouse space in Sturgis, Michigan.
Gro Alliance Launches Strategic Reinvestment
The deal also signals the start of a strategic reinvestment plan for Gro Alliance. Future investments will be launched under four pillars: seed production, seed nursery services (United States and Chile), germplasm out licensing through Breeder Direct, and agtech incubation support for innovators and new market entrants.
“This is one of the rare, triple-win deals.” says Jim Schweigert, president of Gro Alliance. “First, the employees, contractors, and growers at each site will transition to another strong and future-focused family-owned company. Further, Beck’s gets outstanding seed facilities in top growing locations and Gro Alliance will retain core functions in each area while securing resources to fuel additional investment and growth.”
The deal with Beck’s continues Gro Alliance’s evolution and diversification. In 2019, it initiated a business model revision that sought to diversify the company into a vertically integrated seed supply chain solutions business across multiple crops.
In 2020, it launched Breeder Direct (www.breederdirect.com) to offer elite corn and soybean germplasm to independent seed companies. It then announced commercialization partnerships with ZeaKal (www.zeakal.com) in 2021 and BioLumic (www.biolumic.com) in 2023. In 2024, Gro Alliance entered into an agreement with Seed-X (www.seed-x.com) to bring it’s AI seed improvement technology to the United States and opened its first vegetable seed improvement location in Davis, California in December 2024.
These expansions have positioned Gro Alliance as the only independent company to offer genetics, production, and services across all crop types, including vegetables, row crops, oilseeds, and small grains.
“A constantly evolving industry offers unlimited opportunity for companies that evolve with it.” says Schweigert. “The most exciting thing is that this is just the beginning. We have additional innovation partnerships signed and are actively supporting new and unique business models for independent seed companies.”
Contact Schweigert at jim.schweigert@groalliance.com to see how Gro Alliance can support the vision of your seed company or start up.