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Growing demand for inulin pushes Beneo ahead in Japan

Due to the rapid rise in interest among Japanese consumers for prebiotic fiber, Beneo and DKSH saw an important business opportunity and set about to triple Beneo’s Orafti Inulin business within three years.

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Food and Beverage Ingredients

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Japan

Beneo is part of the Südzucker Group, one of the leading food producers in Europe with experience in developing and producing functional ingredients. Beneo covers more than 80 markets all over the world and has five production facilities located in Belgium, Germany, Italy and Chile.

DKSH Japan has been Beneo’s business partner in Japan for its Orafti Inulin and oligofructose products, contributing to its market expansion and strengthening its relationship with key accounts, for more than 20 years.

Challenge

The increasing demand for functional and healthy food in Japan led to a rising interest in prebiotic dietary fiber, especially inulin, derived from chicory roots providing nutritional benefits to the human body. Decades of strong scientific evidence has clinically linked Beneo’s Orafti Inulin to several health benefits such as improving digestive health, reducing the risk of diabetes and reducing weight.

Since Japanese consumers were mostly familiar with probiotics (live cultures) a couple of years ago, prebiotic dietary fiber was a relatively new concept in Japan. DKSH Japan and Beneo identified this key business opportunity and set a challenging target to triple the sales of Beneo’s Orafti Inulin products within three years.

Approach

Over the past three years, DKSH Japan focused its marketing efforts on the prebiotic fiber trend and promoted Orafti ingredients to its large customer base. DKSH Japan leveraged its technical know-how to present detailed product and formulation concepts, as well as delivering hundreds of formulations and prototypes containing Orafti ingredients from its state-of-the-art innovation center in Japan.

DKSH also collaborated with Beneo’s technical team to develop innovative tailor-made solutions for its local customers, resulting in new business opportunities for the product portfolio.

As a leading Market Expansion Services provider in Asia, DKSH Japan further supported Beneo through the complexities the distribution and logistics supply chain to ensure a continued and uninterrupted supply of its products to customers.

Result

Beneo recognized DKSH Japan’s stellar sales results with two awards for “Best Growth” and “Biggest Single Launch” during Beneo’s global sales network meeting in 2020.

We have been working with DKSH for more than two decades in Japan and we are very heartened that their efforts to develop the inulin market have paid off. Thanks to their effective marketing and sales activities, as well as a close working relationship with customers, manufacturers in Japan now think of Orafti inulin and oligofructose when looking for prebiotic dietary fiber. We look forward to many more years of success with DKSH in Japan.

Christian Philippsen, Managing Director (BENEO Asia Pacific)

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