Case study:
Product development support to benchmark novel medical food product
Background:
The client, an R&D driven FMCG company, approached Boyds to help them better understand how to successfully develop and position their novel medical food product in the market. Existing data was available to show the potential of the food product to lower cholesterol and improve cardiovascular health, however, what was not known was how the product could be benchmarked against both current food products, and the clinical claims that would be able to be made.
Boyds approach
The Boyds’ Product Development team worked to understand the landscape of the market and identify potential competitor products, their biological effects and marketing claims. They also explored what biologically significant changes to cholesterol, body weight and other cardiovascular endpoints would be required to support the claims the client wishes to make.
The client approached Boyds as this was an area of expertise outside of their internal team, and they needed the support of the Boyds team who were able to dedicate the time to understand current medical or functional food products from a scientific and commercial point of view. The medical/functional food product market is vast, and a lot of focus was directed to identifying and researching similar or relevant products already in the market.
The Boyds team then interrogated the data room to ascertain the quality of information being presented by the target company to the client. Upon delving deeper into the information provided, a significant number of questions were raised by the Boyds team and passed on to the target company. The target company provided detailed answers to these questions, allowing the Boyds team to make an informed judgment and advising the client that the clinical programs were proceeding as reported by the target company.
Impact and Outcomes
This development project was under threat of being terminated by the client. However, the research and work carried out by the Boyds’ Product Development team persuaded the client to take the project forward and develop the product. A target product profile (TPP) was developed through identification of the key ingredients in market-leading products and comparison against the client’s product. This exercise also helped to define the likely critical endpoints for any future clinical trials with the product, which in such a competitive market, will be fundamental in realising the commercial potential available to a best-in-class medical food in this market
The results of the clinical trial will be fascinating to see the effect the product has on cardiovascular health. With such huge market potential for a product such as this, there is an opportunity for it to be developed as a best-in-class medical food, subject to the results of the clinical trial.
