Oxford Nutrascience gets UK patent for chewy confectionery composition technology

Oxford Nutrascience Group PLC (LON:ONG) said it has been granted a 20 year UK patent for its chewy confectionery composition technology.

It is valid from the date of submission, 7 August 2006, and covers the company's technology which allows sugars to be replaced with fibres and for the product to be fortified with vitamins and other nutraceutical ingredients.

An application for a European chewy confectionery patent was submitted on 27 March 2007, and granting of the European patent is expected in due course.
Chairman and chief technology officer Marcelo Bravo said: “The granting of this patent in the UK strengthens the commercialisation of our chews. “This addition to our patent portfolio provides further validation of the company's strategy of developing intellectual property that can be successfully exploited to build a business in the medicine and consumer healthcare sector.”

Two weeks ago, Oxford Nutrascience announced the launch of Chewyz, a reduced sugar, high fibre, vitamin-enriched soft chew which will initially be sold through Tesco Nutri Centre stores.

Each sweet contains 50mg of Omega 3, vitamins A, C, D & E and 35% fibre. So they are healthier than normal soft chews.

Initially Chewyz will be sold into the confectionery market via high street and supermarket outlets.  But eventually they will be rolled out into the global confectionery and healthcare markets, starting with the US next year.

The launch of the chews follows the signing of the manufacturing agreement in May with Lamy Lutti, one of the largest confectionery manufacturers in Europe.

Further chews are due to be brought to market during 2011.

Oxford Nutrascience is gaining traction for its innovative functional food products.

In September it revealed it was licensing out its Chewitab technology to DCC Health & Beauty Solutions.

The agreement is open ended and non-exclusive.

Oxford will earn royalties on any DCC product sold in chewable tablet form, including healthcare supplements.

DCC is a service provider to healthcare and mail order companies and it has an enviable client list, which includes Merck, GSK, Healthspan and Vitabiotics.