LycoRed Expands Natural Beta-Carotene Production

BEER SHEVA, IsraelIn response to the growing demand of food and beverage companies in the United States, Western Europe and Asia-Pacific, LycoRed is expanding production capacity of its natural beta-carotene coloring line. The expansion of natural beta-carotene coloring line will take place at LycoReds state-of-the-art facilities in the Ukraine, where B.Trispora biomass is produced. Production is expected to grow by double digits throughout 2014.

LycoRed carries a variety of beta-carotene formulations under the brand name Lyc-O-Beta. Included are several emulsion and dispersion systems designed specifically for a wide variety of beverage and food applications. The company will showcase Intense®, its new line of formulations of natural beta-carotene colors, at the FiE show, Nov. 19-21 in Frankfurt.

The production expansion is a result of a growing global demand for LycoReds natural beta-carotene colors, as well as supplying agreements with leading food and beverage companies," said Roee Nir, global commercial manager of color for LycoRed. The trend of replacing artificial colors with natural food colors started several years ago, and now the increasing concern of consumers has led to their direct approach to major food and beverage companies. They are demanding manufacturers to remove or replace artificial colors. Our recently launched Lyc-O-Beta Intense and BetaCote Intense spurred market interest beyond our expectations." Lyc-O-Beta Intense delivers higher color intensity for orange-colored beverages, allowing reduced colorant usageand therefore higher cost effectivenessfor the customers.

According to recent data provided by Innova Market Insights, 2012 alone accounts for nearly all of the 28.0% of product launches tracked with natural food colorants between 2008 and 2012. The average annual growth of product launches with natural food colorants is 22%.

During the IFT 2013 Expo, that took place in Chicago, LycoRed introduced new formulations of natural, vegetarian red colorants as part of its Tomat-O-Red® line of tomato lycopene color.