The company, which has been publicly listed on the Australian Stock Exchange since December 9 last year, said that the post-IPO priority was to build on the existing momentum, ramp up marketing, sales, and brand development, with China as one of the key markets.
The company also operates in Australia and Hong Kong.
Its latest sales performance in the quarter ending in December 2019 saw volume and net revenue up by about 30%, exceeding the half year forecast.
“Goat milk appeals, it is premium and the health benefits that mothers are seeing in our Oli6 goat infant formula is very appealing, so that underpins our strong sales growth,” CEO Ben Dingle told NutraIngredients-Asia.
He added that the goat milk category was growing at five times more than that of the wider infant formula category.
In China, its product distribution is mainly backed by the corporate daigous, as well as e-commerce platforms Tmall, JD, VIP, and social commerce tool The Little Red Book.
Asked if the increasing number of goat milk competitors in China would pose a threat to the company's standing in the Chinese market, Dingle believes that the trend will work to the company’s favour instead, as the presence of more market players can further raise consumers’ awareness of goat milk products.
“There is only a handful of imported goat milk formula in China. There are not many goat milk brands as compared to the number of cow milk brands. Also, one brand cannot be in everywhere in China…we clearly still see unmet demand in the wider China market.
“We don’t even see that there is a competition. We see it more as a ‘co-opetition’, where we are building category awareness,” Dingle said, explaining that China was a multi-dimension market with vast opportunities.
As for the ongoing novel coronavirus, he said that the impact on business remained to be seen.
“Things are evolving very quickly, and things are very fluid day by day, so it is a bit early to say exactly what impact it is going to have.”
Offline and online
Nuchev currently sells its products to China only via the cross-border e-commerce route.
However, it has already applied to register its Oli6 brand with China’s State Administration of Market Regulation (SAMR) for selling the products in the offline space two years ago.
With the O2O (offline to online) distribution growing in China, Dingle said that the two channels were just as important for selling products in the country.
“We are waiting for the next stage to occur, which we envisage will be a visit from the audit team to audit our application and then the granting of the registration.
“We remain very confident in the process,” Dingle said.
