Fytexia targets US expansion with new US-structure and Med Diet science

14-Oct-2013 - Last updated on 15-Oct-2013 at 14:51 GMT

Related tags Mediterranean diet Fruit Olive oil

French raw material supplier Fytexia wants to more than double its US business within five years by bringing the benefits of the Mediterranean Diet to North America, as it opens a sales office in the New York City area and a warehouse in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Lionel Schmitt, President of Fytexia, told us that the US accounted for 30% of its total sales in 2013, with Utah a key focus due to it being one of the states with the highest concentration of nutraceutical companies.

“We believe US could amount for 70% of total sales within 5 years,” he added.

Med diet

The company’s headquarters, located in the South of France, are surrounded by vineyards and orchards, giving it an easy access to top quality raw materials: citrus, olive, grapes. Fytexia’s

“Polyphenols we extract from olives or oranges have synergistic effects when taken together and are much more efficient than when taken alone,” explained Schmitt. These effects go from fat-burning to reduction of LDL-cholesterol, protection against oxidative stress, and more, he said.

“This variety is the key idea behind all of our products, especially one of our major ingredients, Oxxynea, made of a blend of 22 fruit & vegetables and standardized in several types of polyphenols, which has catechins, procyanidins, gallic acid, and so on.”

Other leading ingredients, Sinetrol (extracts from orange, red orange, and grapefruit) or Oleactiv (a blend of Mediterranean olive extracts and select fruit & vegetable extracts and concentrates), are already used in flagship products in the US, but these products are not co-branded, said Schmitt, and are therefore confidential.

There is strong interest in the Mediterranean Diet in the US, said Schmitt. “The benefits of polyphenols from Mediterranean fruit and vegetable are a relevant and identified answer to the US metabolic syndrome issue,” he said. “Sources such as grape and olive are already well-known and generate a significant business in the US territory.”

Science

The company’s five branded ingredients – Sinetrol, Oleactiv, Fiit-ns, Oxxynea, and Mangoselect – are all supported by in vivo studies, with may also supported by human clinical studies, said the company. The company’s founder, Dr Constantin Dallas, has been central to the company’s R&D.

The efficacy of Sinetrol, for example, is supported by two clinical trials, said the company. Results of the first werepublished in 2008 in Phytomedicine (Vol. 15, pp. 783-792).

More recently, Dr Dallas and his co-workers reported that ‘Sinetrol-XPur’ was associated with a 5.71% reduction in waist circumference, compared to 1.56% in the placebo group. Reductions in hip size and fat were also recorded by the researchers (Phytotherapy Research, doi: 10.1002/ptr.4981). The study included 95 people.

Schmitt confirmed that the company has two more publications in the pipeline for release in 2014.