Food ingredients distributor Barentz International has acquired New Skyport, a distributor of specialty ingredients for the food and nutrition industry in China.
With a population of 1.4 billion consumers and a rapidly expanding middle class, Barentz says the demand for specialty food ingredients in China follows consumer demand for more sophisticated food and nutrition products. It says the Chinese consumer is more concerned with health and the quality of food products, enabling a good market for high quality specialized food ingredients.
Being the main distributor of the Roquette Freres products in China, New Skyport has a leading position with major manufacturers of food products in China.
Headquartered in Shanghai, with four branch offices across the Chinese East coast and one inland, New Skyport services customers in the food, beverage, confectionary, nutrition, supplements, health and well-being sectors across the country.
Barentz International, headquartered in The Netherlands, is active in close to 50 countries across three continents.
“Owning a distribution business in China has long been part of our expansion plan. With almost 30 people on staff in Shanghai, Dalian, Tianjin, Quingdao, Guangzhao and Chengdu, we will be able to serve a large customer base,” says Barentz International CEO Hidde van der Wal.
“Being close to ports where our ingredients come in from Europe will be an advantage for our customers, who can be served from our different warehouses in short lead times.”
“We intend to also expand our supplier base in China and add some of the principals we have been working with in Europe, so we can serve our customers in China even better.”
Barentz traditionally has a strong position in specialty ingredients and nutritional and functional blends.
It offers specialty fibers, phosphates, novel proteins as well as (natural) sweeteners and salt replacers.
The company also has a solid position in fortification blends for infant and medical nutrition in Europe and Asia Pacific.
“Part of the synergy of this acquisition lies with our daughter company Vitablend. It is well known that Chinese customers are buying high quality, safe baby food products in Europe,” says Hidde van der Wal.
“From our Vitablend factory in Singapore we can supply local Chinese infant nutrition manufacturers with high quality blends to use in their local brands.”
Barentz will take over the management of the New Skyport business over the next couple of months and will operate under the legal entity Barentz (Shanghai) Trading Company Co.
