Bayn Europe and Barentz have mutually agreed upon the termination of their exclusive stevia distribution contract in Europe effective from Sep 2016, a new cooperation model is under discussion. The decision comes after mutual evaluation of market potential and business strategies, and it opens up for Bayn Europe to work also with other solution driven partners to reach more food and beverage companies for healthy sugar reduction in Europe.

The exclusivity contract for the stevia solution between Bayn Europe and Barentz has been in effect since March 2012, and was signed after a one-year evolution following the approval of stevia in the EU in Nov 2011. The two companies have since worked together to set a sales strategy for stevia on the European market.

“The cooperation with Barentz enabled a route to market for Bayn’s stevia application in the European market,” said Lucy Dahlgren, MD Bayn Europe. “As the market is now maturing, both parties saw a need to renegotiate our cooperation agreement. The termination of the exclusivity supports Bayn’s continued market expansion and opens up for us to work with new partners for our sugar reduction solution. We look forward to continuing to provide stevia as a single ingredient to Barentz as a market leader in food ingredient distribution.”

”Bayn has evolved from a stevia specialist to a sugar reduction specialist,” said Geert Ingelbert, VP Food and Nutrition, Barentz. “During the past years both companies have invested a lot in market and sales exploring and gained market trust, Barentz decided to focus on stevia as a raw material for the future market, and the termination of exclusivity was based on Barentz business model and focus.”

Since 2011, Bayn said it has worked closely with Barentz to train their sales team and to give them stevia technical application knowledge for achieving sugar reduction benefit. The cooperation is said to have helped both companies gain customer relationships in the field of sugar reduction by using stevia, while also having proven the technical capability in taste and texture of Bayn’s sugar reduction solutions based on stevia.

“Sugar is a multi functional ingredient and plays a key role in the flavour, structure and function of food we consume today,” said Dahlgren. “Reducing and removal of sugar from food gives rise to changes and problems which cannot be addressed by solely adding sweet taste like Stevia. We are now discussing with strategic partners who are focused on bringing market value in an holistic and systematic manner for healthy sugar reduction.”