Sugar free: The new Ayurveda buzzword

India's homegrown ayurvedic health supplement 'chyawanprash,' which has seen stagnant and at times declining growth over several years, is on a revival path as a business product.

The new lease of life is led by chyawanprash's new generation variants that are 'sugar-free' and 'pre-biotic'. These versions improve immunity levels.

Ranbaxy, the country's top drug firm by sales, is the latest entrant to the sugar-free chyawanprash segment. The company, which announced its sugar-free 'Chyawan Active', plans to introduce the product in four North Indian states before the national launch.

Dabur and Alkem are firms that have already launched sugar-free chyawanprash brands to tap the growing market for branded chyawanprash. Himalaya and Zandu are also major players in this segment, estimated to be over Rs 300 crore (Rs 3 billion).

Chyawanprash brands showed a huge jump in sales last year. Industry sources quote market research firm AC Neilsen to indicate that branded chywanprash market grew 19.5 per cent in 2006-07 as against 2.6 per cent in 2005-06.

Apart from national players, there are hundreds of local ayurvedic firms that produce this classical ayurvedic medicine.

Industry estimates suggest that the branded segment has exploited just over four per cent of market potential. The entry of players like Ranbaxy can only expand the market further.

"With lifestyle related diseases on the rise, Chyawan Active offers an excellent nutritional format for the entire family, especially to the health and calorie conscious individuals, diabetics, obese and overweight people," said Ranbaxy CEO and MD Malvinder Mohan Singh.

The first mover advantage of "sugar free" chyawanprash will, however, go to Dabur, the market leader that enjoys over 60 per cent of the country's chyawanprash market.

The company had introduced its "Chyawanprakash" brand as a sugar-free variant last year and is in the process of making it available on a national scale. Dabur also has other two variants - Chyawan Junior, a chocolate-flavoured granular variant of Dabur Chyawanprash and Dabur ChyawanShakti, a stress-reliever variant.

A Dabur spokesperson said that Dabur will continue to introduce more variants in future to establish the product's relevance for people across all age-categories. Interestingly, Dabur Chyawanprash grew faster than the market, reporting a 24.5 percent year on year growth during 2006-07.

"We are confident that entry of new players and introduction of these variants, along with our campaign that aims to establish the product's relevance to today's audience, will help improve chyawanprash's market penetration," the Dabur spokesperson said.

Alkem, another pharmaceutical major that floated a health food division a year ago, is the third player in the sugar-free chyawanprash market.

"Alkem's Jeevan Prash is prepared using patented sugar-free applications. It is targeting consumers of every age and positions as a pre-biotic that improves immunity level of patients suffering from lifestyle disorders," Sharad Kasarlee, Head, Alkem Health Foods said.

According to Kasarlee, re-positioning chyawanprash was the need of the hour with the ever-increasing number of lifestyle disorders like diabetes, hypertension and obesity.