Senomyx narrows loss in first quarter

01-May-2011 - Last updated on 02-May-2011 at 14:44 GMT

Related tags Sugar

California-based flavor ingredients firm Senomyx has narrowed its net loss in Q1 and increased revenues, as the company continues to discover, develop and commercialize new flavor ingredients.

For the first quarter ended March 31, revenues were up 13 percent to $8.7m from $7.7m for the same period in 2010, and the company made a net loss of $1.26m, compared to $1.78m a year earlier.

CEO Kent Snyder said: “We are off to a strong start in 2011. Our partners continue to make good progress with their commercialization activities, and we continue to advance our Discovery & Development programs.”

Snyder said that the company is particularly pleased with flavor firm Firmenich’s activities with its sucrose enhancer, S6973, which allows up to a 50 percent reduction in sugar in a wide range of products.

“Firmenich has produced commercial quantities of S6973 and they expect to record their first commercial sale to a major-brand customer during the second quarter,” he said.

Firmenich also has exclusive rights to market Senomyx’s sucralose enhancer, S2383, which is said to allow sucralose reduction of up to 75 percent, for which Senomyx has recently been granted a US patent.

Snyder added that there has also been significant progress with the company’s cooling flavors program.

“We have now identified new cooling flavors that mimic the time-intensity profile of agents that have rapid onset and short acting cooling effects, as well as agents with slow onset and long acting cooling effects,” he said. “Many of our lead cooling flavor candidates have demonstrated approximately ten-fold greater potency than a commonly used agent in taste tests. These new cooling flavors are currently being evaluated in a variety of product prototypes.”

Vice president and chief financial officer Tony Rogers said: “The first quarter financial results were in-line with management expectations. Furthermore, we remain on-track to achieve our 2011 financial guidance as provided in March.”