We are frequently asked if we are developing our own products, a line of G2 proprietary genetics. And the answer to that question is: "Yes, of course we are".
What are we breeding? Well, at the risk of seeming evasive, you can figure this out rather simply by considering the backgrounds of G2's two principals, Mike Uchneat and Rick Grazzini. We are not breeding any species which is not consistent with our training, experience, and personal interests.
That said, we have a rather aggressive business model that requires each of us to develop 50 or 60 new products during our first decade in business, and then license those to the industry. That's a pretty large number for anyone to handle. Our solution is to pursue quick-turn projects early, while at the same time, beginning some of the long-term projects in parallel. For instance, each of us has quick-turn projects in vegetative annuals, since these can be brought into market in 3 to 5 years. But each of us also has woody plant projects which may take 15 to 20 years to bring to market. If we were to wait for the early projects to be complete, we'd be that much further behind on the longer projects. If we only started the long projects now, we might not survive long enough to get around to the quicker ones. So ... we start both kinds at the same time, letting the early ones get to market quickly enough to provide cash flow to keep the longer projects running.
Each of us also has edible projects. Vegetables. Culinary herbs. We conduct these projects more like vegetative annual projects, even though most of the edibles projects are likely to be seed-propagated. This is because we see our edibles projects as being relatively quick. At least when compared to a woody ornamental.
The interaction between our contract research (CR) world, and that of our own breeding projects, has some obvious conflict potential. We chose to resolve these early by avoiding the most obvious conflicts. If someone brings us a contract breeding project in a species where we are actively breeding to the same objectives, we simply turn it down. If someone brings us a project which is related to a project in which we are actively breeding, we disclose what we are doing --- at least in broad terms --- and let the client decide if there is conflict. If the client chooses to proceed (and they usually do), we simply isolate the G2 breeder from the contract project. 
Confidentiality is a critical component of any CR relationship. In the G2 model, we do not want cross-talk between projects, even when a tech or a scientist may have to work on both projects. It is not realistic to have separate growers, for instance, tending to each project separately. But it is possible to isolate a breeder from a project. If you are the breeder with the potential conflict, you don't interact with the conflicting contract project. You don't take data. You avoid making even casual observations of the conflicting project. You don't even help transplant the project if it goes to the field.
This sounds a lot more complicated than it is. Maintaining confidentiality in a CR relationship rapidly becomes second nature, and almost intuitive. If you have to think about it, it's probably going to be a problem.
So yes, we are actively developing our own proprietary genetics.
We also need to point out that access to G2 proprietary genetics is integrally connected to our CR model. "First-look, first-choice" on G2 proprietary genetics will always be offered to our CR clients before we take a product out to the open market. Only if none of our CR clients licenses a product will we release it to the open market. Stated simply, if you expect to license a G2 product in the future, you should be finding ways in which to do contract research with us now.
