Five minutes at FI Europe  with … 

Tamara Rausch – Product Management Europe

Agro Food Industry Hi-Tech: What is unique in your health nutrition offer?
Tamara Rausch: Lycored is the leading company in natural carotenoids. The hero product is of course lycopene that we extract from tomatoes, which we’ve researched for over 21 years. We’re also proud tooffer lutein, alpha and beta-carotene, astaxanthin and a full range of natural carotenoids. In addition we are a strong partner in microencapsulation technology. This means we encapsulate our carotenoids, vitamins and minerals to make them safe, stable, bioavailable and efficient. We always operate in a clinically responsible way, which is part of our mission.

AF: What can you tell me about your encapsulation technology?
TR: Vitamins and other health ingredients are complex molecules that tend to be unstable when they are exposed to light, oxygen, and heat or different PH conditions, so they need  protection in terms of a coating. Our technology helps to put a layer around the vitamin to make it more stable and bioavailable, and also to mask taste and odor – this is particularly important for minerals which tend to crossinteract with Vitamins and Carotenoids, because it allows them to be included in challenging products such as nutritional bars, gummies or powders. We use several different materials and have a particular focus onon vegetarian technologies including starch and alginate based solutions which meet requirements for clean label, vegetarian status and also bioavailability advantages. We offer fluidized bed coating, beadlet technology and spray drying for increased stability and shelf life, and protection against interaction, and less overage. That leads to cost in use advantage, kosher, halal, and vegetarian solutions as well as water solubility.

AF: Lycopene, like other antioxidants, can have bioavailability issues. How do you tackle this challenge?

TR: Carotenoids are in general fatsoluble ingredients, so we need a technology to make them bioavailable in the stomach and gut. We have an outstanding VBAF (vegetarian Beadlet allergen free) technology that is alginate-based, and we always recommend that lycopene is taken with a meal to improve absorption. Our concepts also include twice a day recommendations to increase efficiency, reflecting our science-based promotion of our health ingredients.

AF: What type of extraction do you use?
TR: We use a single solvent extraction process, using an organic solvent. Our technology allows us to remove all solvents in the end product – that’s why we can offer high quality products. Our patented extraction process allows to keep the molecules as naturally as they occur in the fruit or in nature itself without any chemical modification of the active ingredients that are relevant for the health benefits. Our vertical integration structure gives us full control on each step of the value chain and full control, leading to exceptional quality. Our unique value lies in nature itself as we offer natural whole fruit extracts that provide the ingredients in the natural matrix, which is genuinely most bioavailable and effective for humans. Our science tests the synergies between those ingredients, paving the strategic direction for our innovations, incuding our Lycored Nutrient Complexes which benefit from the synergistic mode of action of the naturally occurring components from the tomato.

AF: Some of your ingredients are aimed at skin care. What is your approach to beauty from within?
TR: 21 years ago Lycored started their research with the goal of providing“protection inside out”. Skin care is our top priority in terms of marketing but is also reflected in our clinical research plan. We have several products for skin health and beauty, offering various benefits including UV Protection, slowing markers for collagen degradation which leads to aging, skin tone and skin complexion/glow.  Our star product in this category is Lycoderm, a composition of tomato extract together with carnosic acid rosemary extract – all completely natural. It protects against UV light and other environmental stressors that cause skin aging and compromise on beautiful skin. It also prevents against collagen degradation and seems to have benefits regarding wrinkle formation, skin elasticity and texture as well as radiance and glow.

AF: What other health benefits does Lycored target?
TR: Our mission is to work in a clinically responsible way.  That means we only promote what we can prove to work. That’s why we invest in clinical research as a core part of our UVP. We reinvest a lot of our turnover in our R&D department, headquartered in Israel, that also takes care of the clinical studies investigated with our KOLs and scientific partners around the globe.

Apart from skin and beauty, another area we are heavily involved in is heart health. We have proven that our Cardiomato™ product, a tomato extract with phytosterols, not only reduces total cholesterol but also protects cholesterol from oxidation, with clear benefits for vessel function and atherosclerosis prevention as well as the management of blood pressure. We also offer a men’s health product for prostate health which inhibits hyperplasia of prostate tissue, which is the leading cause of men’s discomfort and reduced quality of life.  And we offer a women’s health product that counteracts some of the effects of the menopause, including hot flushes and osteoporosis. All of these finished product solutions come from tomato extracts. We have innovated a technology to balance these naturally occurring components from the tomato according to the specific health target. For example our women’s health product Lycofem™ combines the whole food tomato extract paired with isoflavones, in order to reduce hot flushes and other side effects of the menopause including bone degradation.

AF: What is the unique health advantage of tomato extract, compared to other antioxidant sources?
TR: The uniqueness of our hero ingredients lies in the fact that the source of the products is a whole food extract. It is not so much the leading component lycopene as the whole fruit extract itself, with all its components -from various carotenoids, sterols, to vitamin A and E, to minerals.  That combination guarantees a superior benefit. Through our innovation pipeline we are currently investigating synergies and researching combinations with ingredients from other plants as well.

AF: What can we expect from Lycored in the future?
TR: We have a mission: we want to become the ingredient supplier of choice for ingestible skin care and beauty, and we are committed to reaching our goal.