Sugar alternative a sweet success

AN IRISH technology company has claimed a significant breakthrough in the battle against obesity by developing a new alternative to sugar.

Fusion Nutraceuticals claims its new sweetener is closer to sugar in taste and texture than any previous sweetening product, but without the calories.

The product, which is due to be launched next June, looks, feels and tastes like sugar, but has zero calorific content, the company says. Fusion applied for a patent for the process to manufacture the next generation product last September and prototype development is currently under way.

With concern growing about the role played by high-sugar foods in the development of lifestyle-related conditions such as obesity and diabetes, manufacturers are urgently seeking to reformulate their products to meet the consumer demand for healthier food.

The world sugar market is worth €50 billion a year but the growth of artificial sweeteners has been slowed by taste limitations and other drawbacks. Sweetener ingredients such as aspartame and saccharin have failed to make a big dent in the popularity of sugar while sucralose, which is extracted directly from sugar, was on patent to Tate Lyle until 2006.

Since then, however, a number of companies, among them Fusion, have attempted to improve on sucralose by making it more attractive to food manufacturers and the public. The Dublin-based company said its variant had the granular, crystalline appearance of sugar, thereby making it more appealing to consumers.

“It pours like sugar and has the same sparkling appearance, and it crunches in your mouth the way you’d expect a sweetener to,” said Fergus Clarke, executive director of Fusion.

The company, which is currently raising funds for further product development, plans to source the product from an Indian pharmaceutical company, Alkem Laboratories, and carry out additional production and packaging with partners in Ireland.