BRAUNSCHWEIG, GERMANY — Nordzucker AG and PureCircle Ltd. formed a joint venture, NP Sweet.

The new joint venture is owned equally by Nordzucker and PureCircle and will develop and market products that combine the natural benefits of both sugar and stevia for the purpose of meeting requirements for natural reduced-calorie sweet applications. NP Sweet will use the combined resources of both companies with access to the scale, distribution and sugar technologies of Nordzucker with the high purity stevia technologies and product innovation of PureCircle.

“Since we announced our discussions with PureCircle in September there has been a very positive reaction from our clients who are keen to access steviasucrose as a complement to our core sugar portfolio,” said Niels Porksen, chief agricultural officer for Nordzucker.

Both companies believe the creation of the joint venture will be important for growth once stevia has achieved E.U. regulatory clearance.

“We believe that our steviasucrose concepts offer food and beverage producers highly efficient solutions, where sweetening with excellent taste is combined with facilitated production opportunities,” said Lars Bo Jorgensen, general manager for NP Sweet. “Our customers benefit from the partners’ unique and individually strong platforms in stevia technology and sucrose application technology for a broad spectrum of foods and beverages. Our technologies are underpinned by integrated supply chains that offer customers sustainability and traceability from field to final application. No other company can offer this.”