A YORK business that has developed low calorie sweet fibres is close to having its product exclusively manufactured and distributed by a global corporate after signing a new agreement.

OptiBiotix Health which develops compounds to tackle obesity, high cholesterol and diabetes from its York Science Park headquarters, has announced that it has entered into an agreement with a global corporate for its SweetBiotix low calorie sweet fibres.

The agreement sets out the terms and grants exclusivity, for six months, to negotiate a license agreement for the scale up, manufacture and distribution of SweetBiotix.

OptiBiotix will receive monthly payments during this exclusivity period amounting to a six figure sum.

The firm had previously announced in March that it has carried out five successful human taste studies on a range of products developed from its SweetBiotix development programmes.

This has created interest from a number of corporates with expertise in the manufacture and commercialisation of speciality ingredients and/or consumer products. The new agreement reflects the materialisation of interest from one of these companies.

The company is a global supplier of nutritional and agricultural products to companies around the world with an annual turnover exceeding $100 billion, however it requires its identity and the terms of the agreement to remain confidential.

Stephen O'Hara, chief executive of OptiBiotix, sad: "We are pleased to announce the signing of this agreement for SweetBiotix with one of the world's largest suppliers of nutritional and agricultural products.

"This is the second agreement with global partners for products created from our SweetBiotix development programmes. This is part of a strategy of working with global partners to support scale up, manufacture and commercialisation of a range of SweetBiotix products."