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Safe Foods Corp. of North Little Rock announced Monday that a wholly-owned subsidiary of Jubilant Organosys Ltd. of Noida, India, now has a minority investment in the company through a stock purchase agreement.

Jubilant will become a supplier of cetylpyridinium chloride, which is the active ingredient in Safe Foods' patented Cecure brand antimicrobial solution.

Details of the agreement were not disclosed.

Cecure is being used by food processors in the U.S. and elsewhere as a food safety intervention.

"Safe Foods is responding to a rapidly growing international demand for Cecure, which is now widely recognized as one of the safest and most effective food safety interventions available to food processors," Curtis W. Coleman, president and CEO of Safe Foods Corp., said in a news release. "This strategic alliance with one of the world's leading contract research and manufacturing companies will be key in enabling Safe Foods to take full advantage of this demand in the global marketplace. We've long had the goal of helping make the world's food supplies safer, and this is a very important step in that direction."

Currently the chemical and application process is being used to reduce food-borne illnesses in raw chicken, and the company has plans to expand the process to other foods.

"Cecure can be used to safely control pathogens on all foods," Coleman said. "And we are aggressively moving forward with food processors and regulators in multiple countries to make that possible."

Cecure also gives the chicken a longer shelf life, in some cases 20 to 30 percent longer than chicken that isn't treated with the product, the company said.

Safe Foods is a privately-held company that was born out of Arkansas BioVentures, the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences' business accelerator program.

"Obviously the additional capital gives us more cash flow and more ability to expand more rapidly into new geographical markets and new food segments domestically and internationally," Rush Deacon, president of Safe Foods International, said.

Deacon said international sales are currently "very limited," but the partnership with Jubilant Organosys is part of Safe Foods' push for global expansion.

"We expect international sales to go up dramatically throughout the rest of this year," he said.

Cecure is patented in more than 100 countries and has regulatory approval in about a dozen markets.

"We have recognized the vast global potential for this technology and made the investment to begin this rapid development," Deacon said.

Safe Foods has signed contracts in Canada and expects to in other countries including Mexico, South Africa, Saudi Arabia, Europe and South America "within the next few months."

"Then we expect to develop the Asian markets in the second half of this year as well," Deacon said.