Kraig Biocraft Laboratories Inc (KBLB)

[Gyalogtank]

I agree. However this might be the key to Kraig Biocraft's success. Its competitors are frequently mentioned here in the forum, but Spiber and the others have the advantage that they use recombinant microbes raised in fermentors to produce the silk protein. It is much faster, you can get these fermentors and the transgenic yeasts and bacteria approved almost immediately. Depending on the country you can even get an umbrella licence where you only need to get the facility approved and can ferment any kind of microbe you please.

All the while KBLB's silk worms are considered GMOs, it takes years to get them approved, for instance the Aquadvantage salmon spent 23 years in approval phase. However this might turn out to be a hidden advantage: Any company wanting to replicate the technology will need to go through the same process. It took approximately five years to get approval in Vietnam, that means KBLB will have no competition for five whole years once it starts producing.

However Spiber and an other competitor will experience a curious phenomenon: During the years anti-GMO activists managed to completely disrupt biotech patents. Right now a patent only protects the exact DNA sequence listed in the application. You can create a "new" one which differs in a single nucleotide, but encodes the same polypeptide and you can manufacture it anywhere, as patents are easily circumvented.

So a successful KBLB will have no competition for years, while a successful Spiber's alternative manufacturers will spring up overnight.