Reb M capacity increase: PureCircle expands production of its Starleaf stevia

16 Jul 2018 --- Producer of stevia sweeteners, PureCircle, has expanded its capacity to supply significantly more Reb M to global beverage and food companies. Using beverage sweetening as an equivalized example, PureCircle can now supply enough Reb M to sweeten approximately 500 million cases of zero-calorie carbonated soft drinks. The company continues to build production capacity and estimates that three years from now, it could supply enough Reb M to sweeten 1 billion cases of zero-calorie carbonated soft drinks or the equivalent in beverages and foods using Reb M as the sweetener.

Reb M is the variant of stevia sweetener which has the most sugar-like taste and which is most sought after by beverage and food companies, according to PureCircle. The company further estimates that, depending on amounts purchased and terms of purchase, companies buying Reb M from PureCircle will find the cost of using it to sweeten a beverage or food, equivalent to their cost of using sugar to achieve the same level of sweetening.

Speaking to FoodIngredientsFirst, Carolyn Clark, PureCircle’s Global Head of Marketing, says: “PureCircle is further ramping up Reb M availability by taking the plentiful Reb A found in its proprietary Starleaf stevia plants and using that to produce Reb M. While the process is proprietary, we can share that just as the leaf goes through its maturation process converting Reb A > D > M, we have replicated this with the help of an enzyme.”

“There are several factors driving demand for PureCircle’s proprietary Starleaf stevia sweeteners. Consumers and regulatory agencies are calling for sugar reduction,” notes Clark. “Ingredients from Starleaf stevia including Reb M offer great taste, are easy to work with in no added sugar formulations and are now available at a scale necessary for global food and beverage companies.”

“Over the next three years, PureCircle will supply all of its ingredients from Starleaf stevia, which yields 20x more Reb M and other sugar-like sweeteners versus conventional stevia. PureCircle announced plans to plant nearly 16,000 tons in 2019, an increase of about 200 percent over the prior year,” she explains. 

Until now, a challenge has been that Reb M is present only in relatively small amounts in conventional stevia plants. PureCircle has developed a proprietary strain of the stevia plant that it calls Starleaf stevia. Starleaf stevia plants contain greater amounts Reb M than traditional stevia plants and PureCircle is ramping up the planting of Starleaf stevia.

PureCircle produces Reb M both directly from the Starleaf stevia plant and other stevia sweeteners in the plant. In the latter case, PureCircle starts with purified stevia leaf extract with low Reb M content and by adding an enzyme, the maturation to Reb M is completed, just as the leaf does naturally. Enzymes play a similar role in various products including baby food, cheese, other dairy products and chocolate.

The Reb M produced from the two processes are both from the stevia leaf and are identical in taste. All of PureCircle’s stevia sweeteners – produced using either of the above-cited processes – are non-GMO. 

PureCircle’s expansion in production of Reb M will help beverage and food companies obtain supplies of an ingredient they need, 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 innovative 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. 

The story of stevia is evolving. Not long ago, stevia was a little known, plant-based zero-calorie sweetener – basically one ingredient, Reb A – that worked well in some beverage and food applications. But today, we offer Reb M and other stevia leaf sweetener ingredients with sugar-like taste and zero calories. These from-nature sweeteners – often used in combinations with each other – work well in a wide variety of beverages and foods, and that is advantageous for beverage and food companies. They have an increasing need for just such an ingredient because consumers, health experts and governments have become increasingly concerned about obesity and diabetes and consumers have also become increasingly health conscious.

Last month, FoodIngredientsFirst reported that German-based biotechnology company, c-LEcta, together with an unnamed “leading ingredient supplier” developed a new method to help expand production of a new plant-based sweetener.

Speculation from the industry had been that stevia supplier PureCircle was the other partner involved in this project. However, PureCircle neither confirmed or denied a partnership with c-LEcta, but did send the following statement: “We are quickly expanding the availability of the best-tasting stevia sweeteners. We are using two ways to do that. We are rapidly expanding our planting of Starleaf. Starleaf is our proprietary variety of stevia which contains much greater amounts of the best tasting stevia sweeteners like Reb D and Reb M.” 

You can read the full story here. 

By Elizabeth Green