Biovittoria Set to Scale Up Production of Zero-Calorie Natural Sweetener
Hamilton Based natural sweetener manufacturer BioVittoria Ltd will go into this year’s harvest of Luo Han fruit with a new state-of-the-art NZ$7 million processing facility providing the potential for significant up-scaling of the company.BioVittoria completed the processing plant earlier this year and the coming season's harvest will see a significant increase in production, BioVittoria Ltd CEO Mr David Thorrold announced today.
Commissioning of the plant was completed at the tail end of the 2008 Luo Han harvest, but this year the plant will be able to handle as much fruit as the company’s 5000 growers can produce.
“We anticipate processing over 3000 tonnes of fruit from this year’s harvest which will enable us to meet the growing demand for our product.”
BioVittoria is targeting the North American food and beverage industry with its PureLo product, which sells for up to NZ$450 a kilogram.
BioVittoria was founded in 2003 by former HortResearch scientist Dr Garth Smith and American businessman Stephen LeFebvre, who had close New Zealand connections and business interests.
Dr Smith first went to Southern China to research Kiwifruit growing in the plant’s homeland. In the process he met another scientist, Lan Fusheng who is China’s leading expert on Luo Han fruit. They now work together developing new varieties and improved cultivation techniques for the BioVittoria grower network.
Luo Han fruit is unique in that it contains a completely natural zero-calorie sweetener and as such holds huge potential to replace sugar and artificial sweeteners as an increasingly health conscious world moves towards more natural ingredients.
BioVittoria’s business model comprises a vertically integrated value chain from the seedling through to the final ingredient. The company has established a global operation with a team of directors and executives in China, New Zealand and the United States
BioVittoria completed an NZ$11 million capital raising in 2008 to fund the factory and includes amongst its investors Endeavour Capital, the New Zealand Venture Investment Fund, ACC and Sir Stephen Tindall’s K1W1 fund.
PureLo was the first natural sweetener of its type to achieve United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulatory compliance through its Generally Recognised As Safe (GRAS) status, opening up the US market for this product.