ASIA – PureCircle is expanding its portfolio of sweeteners made from stevia with new plant-based, non-GMO, GRAS approved range even as stevia application in the food and beverage sector continue to rise as high as 10% in 2017.
The recent advances boost production to help meet demand for stevia, a sugar substitute containing many sweetener variants, that is Reb A, Reb D and Reb M, components that enhance production of low- and zero-calorie beverages and foods.
PureCircle is embarking on innovation geared at addressing a challenge that has been, that Red D and Red M are present in the stevia plant only in relatively small amounts.
In response to this, the company successfully produced proprietary stevia leaf – Starleaf, containing over 20 times more sugar-like steviol glycoside content compared to standard stevia leaf varieties.
To further enhance availability of Red D and Red M variants, PureCircle has developed two ways of producing the stevia sweetener one by extracting them from its proprietary Starleaf plants and two, directly using the more abundant Reb A in the production process.
Food and beverage companies can then access the ingredients they need due to a stable supply as they continue to respond to their consumers’ desires for more zero- and low-calorie products using plant-based sweeteners.
As the result of its advanced innovation, research and development work with stevia, PureCircle has been granted an array of stevia-related patents.
These patents – plus additional applied for patents cover a wide range of stevia-related products and processes.
PureCircle will vastly increase the amount of Starleaf stevia it plants in 2018 even as global launches of beverage and food products containing stevia having grown steadily since 2012.
