LONGECITY

Calcium Folinate is illegal?

are those the only two forms of folate you have available to you? 5-formyl tetrahydrofolate? how much more expensive would it be to use L-5-methyltetrahydrofolate?

Folate 100mcg folinic acid:
This is no longer legal to use this in a supplement, FDA classified it as a drug in December. We can only use folic acid, l 5 methyl folate is licenced and patented by Merck.

Folinic acid has been used in chemotherapy for years, under the name leucovorin. In fact, my sister in law had it in combination with methotrexate for (successful) treatment of bone cancer 30 years ago. That makes it seem kind of strange that it would only just have been classified as a drug. Another oddity- it's still being sold as a supplement. Are these other guys grandfathered in in some way? Doesn't make sense.

these preferred forms still appear to be legally sold: (personally I think plain old synthetic folic acid is not acceptable)

Folate (as 5-Methyltetrahydrofolic acid (5-MTHF), and calculated based upon the biologically Active 6S isomer)
http://www.iherb.com...Caps/18245?at=0


L-methylfolate-Metafolin
http://www.iherb.com...lets/13961?at=0


Folate (as calcium folinate [folinic acid])
http://www.iherb.com...blets/7735?at=0

Folate (as 5-Methyl-tetrahydrofolate)
http://www.iherb.com...Caps/18447?at=0

i also agree with edward, folic acid is not acceptable unless its literally the only option available anywhere.

Hmmm.... I am checking with another supplier of raw material on this one...

Hmmm.... I am checking with another supplier of raw material on this one...

after a bit of research i think it would be worthwhile to contact merck and see about licensing their metafolin

Hmmm.... I am checking with another supplier of raw material on this one...

after a bit of research i think it would be worthwhile to contact merck and see about licensing their metafolin

Why's that?

Hmmm.... I am checking with another supplier of raw material on this one...

after a bit of research i think it would be worthwhile to contact merck and see about licensing their metafolin

Why's that?

negates the issues with mthfr polymorphisms.

Just to see what kind of pricing we are looking at for with the patented product, I have contacted Merck requesting licensing this item.

A

Hmmm....

it appears they (Merck) want a 5 year commitment for the stuff, I will see if we can get a one time order, to 'test the market' for the new multi.

A

it appears they (Merck) want a 5 year commitment for the stuff, I will see if we can get a one time order, to 'test the market' for the new multi.

That's a good idea. How much do they want for it? Can we commit to "one gram a year for 5 years"? You know, I gotta say, a 5 year commitment is a pretty steep requirement. It seems a little nonsensical; do they have some sort of enormous overhead to start an account or something? Too bad there's no competition in this ingredient. I hope their patent runs out soon.

Hmmm....

it appears they (Merck) want a 5 year commitment for the stuff, I will see if we can get a one time order, to 'test the market' for the new multi.

A

you worked for/with merck in the past right? pull some strings haha

These guys are in Europe, and I was working out of the Miami office here as a consultant quite sometime ago...

Different people, different departments, different research, and a whole different life back then...

A

These guys are in Europe, and I was working out of the Miami office here as a consultant quite sometime ago...

Different people, different departments, different research, and a whole different life back then...

A

gotcha

if metafolin ends up being a no go, we could look into 5-formly tetrahydrofolate, the other major naturally occurring folate. also is there any final word on folinic acid? nearly every major supplement company out there has a product with calcium folinate.

it appears they (Merck) want a 5 year commitment for the stuff, I will see if we can get a one time order, to 'test the market' for the new multi.

That's a good idea. How much do they want for it? Can we commit to "one gram a year for 5 years"? You know, I gotta say, a 5 year commitment is a pretty steep requirement. It seems a little nonsensical; do they have some sort of enormous overhead to start an account or something? Too bad there's no competition in this ingredient. I hope their patent runs out soon.

I just got an email from Merck, letting me know that single kilo orders are not possible.

So I asked him what was the minimum order, and price of course (why do folks forget the all important price?)


I am not sure if I will get a reply, but we will see.

A
Edited by Anthony_Loera, 15 February 2010 - 07:13 PM.

choline bitartrate usually comes as 45%-50% in purity.

I am assuming we don't want the elemental value on this one, as that one ingredient will be about 1100mg for the dose.

If I am assuming incorrectly, and 1100mg should be used, let me know.

Thanks
A

choline bitartrate usually comes as 45%-50% in purity.

I am assuming we don't want the elemental value on this one, as that one ingredient will be about 1100mg for the dose.

If I am assuming incorrectly, and 1100mg should be used, let me know.

Thanks
A

how much space will 1100mg of powder take up? an entire 00 capsule?

i would gladly see choline bit dropped down to 550 mg (yielding 225mg choline) rather than take up an entire capsule for it.

can you find out the % yield of choline citrate?
Edited by ajnast4r, 16 February 2010 - 03:54 PM.

choline bitartrate usually comes as 45%-50% in purity.

I am assuming we don't want the elemental value on this one, as that one ingredient will be about 1100mg for the dose.

If I am assuming incorrectly, and 1100mg should be used, let me know.

Thanks
A

how much space will 1100mg of powder take up? an entire 00 capsule?

i would gladly see choline bit dropped down to 550 mg (yielding 225mg choline) rather than take up an entire capsule for it.

can you find out the % yield of choline citrate?

Choline citrate would be much preferred over bitartrate and at least the retail price of these are fairly close. The literature shows some evidence that certain people don't absorb the bitartrate version as well leading to GI issues. Citrate doesn't have this issue. Personally choline citrate works much better as a high dose choline source in choline depleting conditions (heavy piracetam use leading me to believe that indeed bitartrate is not absorbed as well

- I would personally prefer the full RDA (550 mg) of "elemental" choline go into the formula; however, I wouldn't hold up the project if ONE LOUSY EXTRA PILL (sorry) is enough to make someone go on the warpath.

- Choline citrate is much harder to source and maintain in inventory, often from somewhat non-reputable suppliers, and more expensive than the bitartrate; I really don't think it's worth bothering about, for most.

- Folate-equivalents: I would REALLY prefer not to use folic acid. To be blunt, I am sure that there are suppliers out there who are not scrupulous about IP and who would sell to "us." By the nature of the contact, we would have to be especailly diligent about sending out each batch for identity and purity testing. We would want to use some alternative term (abbreviation, obscure synonym) for it on the label. Alternatively, FDA's ban on folinic acid could also be ignored on a similar strategy.

No problem mike, I will force 550mg of elemental choline, I just thought it was quite a bit.

I understand the rest of your post as well, let me consider it if a supplier is available.

Looks like it will be 6 capsules a day, 180 count bottle.

Hmmm... final pricing is a little high for my taste as we will be limited in regards to wholesale of this item.

This will probably end up being internet only product being sold at very close to what I normally consider to be wholesale price for imminst members, and at a higher price for non-imminst members. Hopefully that helps add more members to imminst as well.

A

what are the speculative prices?

what was the final word on the folate?

A second supplier appears to be able to provide the folate on the list, I have asked for the COA to confirm.

The product will have:
180 Capsules per bottle for a 30 day supply, since 6 capsules would be taken as the daily dose.

Pricing for members will be in the Mid $30's, Folks who are not members will likely get a price around $45-$55. After an we finish up with the license discussions, and it is signed with Imminst.org. I believe he will be able to confirm the costs and pricing with folks internally, since we will be providing a royalty, and he will then have access to our cost info to calculate the royalty appropriately.

Thanks
A

Ouch. This is more expensive than I had hoped. Anthony, are their any particular substances that are the major cost drivers here? What would we have to give up to get it down to $20/month for members? And is this assuming a dry formulation, or beadlets, or what?

Ouch. This is more expensive than I had hoped.

I really think that this is an entirely reasonable price. Remember, this is a supplement with some hard-to-source and/or expensive ingredients, unable to take advantage of economies of scale, and run on doubtless relatively small-scale equipment. LEF, which has a much larger market share and (I expect) physical plant, sells LEF Mix for ~$80, and AOR (which is more our scale) OrthoCore goes for $45 from Relentless.

$45 to $55 does not seem too bad to me (especially for the reasons Michael mentioned, like low volume production). Of course, if we put our heads together and find some way to reduce the cost by a couple bucks, that would be great. I will purchase the multi at this price, not only because it could very well be the best formula available based on known science, but also because I know the money (from this first run anyway) would be going to a known supporter of life extension (Anthony). I see it as win-win even if the cost is up there a bit.

Hi guys,

see attached final ingredient list we will be using for this product.
Let me know if there are any issues, before I green light it's production.

Justin, I need to go over the label design with you once we are on our way to make this product.
Do you have a high res image of the logo we can use on the label?

Thanks
A

Woops...

made a mistake on the Lutein, here is the new ingredient sheet:

A
Edited by Anthony_Loera, 23 February 2010 - 10:32 PM.

I'm worried about the Sodium Metasilicate reacting with the metals. Is there any evidence or reasoning that says this isn't going to be a problem? I asked about this a while ago and PM'd a couple of you, but haven't heard anything about it.

Hi guys,

see attached final ingredient list we will be using for this product.
Let me know if there are any issues, before I green light it's production.

Justin, I need to go over the label design with you once we are on our way to make this product.
Do you have a high res image of the logo we can use on the label?

Thanks
A

I will look into the logo versions available and we can start a discussion later this week. Sound ok?