Author: Staff Writer

The diversified ITC group has forayed into electronic cigarettes to offset shrinking sales of its conventional tobacco cigarettes due to recurrent price increases. The Kolkata-headquartered cigarettes to hotels group has launched two vaping devices, or e-cigarettes, under the Eon brand. The products have been designed in-house but are being manufactured in China, according to The Economic Times-India.

A spokesperson for ITC said the e-cigarettes have been launched in Hyderabad and Kolkata and will be rolled out pan-India in phases. They will also be sold online. Eon comes about 10 months after ITC forayed into the nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) market with “Kwiknic”. Analysts said ITC’s foray into e-cigarettes and NRT is to create newer consumption areas as growing health awareness, the government’s drive against tobacco products and rising cost of combustible cigarettes force consumers to look for alternatives.

Being tobacco-free, Eon and Kwiknic are not subjected to regulations under the Cigarettes and Other Tobacco Products Act and can be consumed, marketed and sold like any consumer product. E-cigarettes are more popular overseas with the US and Europe being the key markets. In India, the category is still at a nascent stage with lesser known imported brands selling online, the ITC spokesperson said.

Zippo Manufacturing Company (ZMC), announced that it has been granted a preliminary injunction in Germany against Cygnet UK Trading Ltd., a Lorillard subsidiary, preventing Cygnet from using the “blu” brand name for e-cigarettes sold in that country.

The Regional Court of Frankfurt am Main agreed with ZMC that the “blu” e-cigarette brand creates a likelihood of confusion with the ZMC’s European Union Community trademark “BLU”, used in connection with its line of high performance, precision butane lighters and fuel. The court found the confusion was due to the high degree of similarity between the marks, an existing similarity between the parties’ respective goods and the ZMC BLU mark’s “at least” average degree of distinctiveness.

ZMC’s action in Germany and the resulting preliminary injunction against Cygnet is part of ZMC’s ongoing, global effort to protect its worldwide portfolio of its BLU trademarks. ZMC has commenced proceedings to oppose applications to register, or to cancel trademark registrations, for the “blu” e-cigarette brand in the United States, Canada, Mexico and the EU. Sweden has already rejected outright Lorillard’s application to register a trademark for “blu.”

Having seen in Brooklyn, New York, a retail truck offering ‘VitaCigs’, the managing editor at Motherboard, Meghan Neal, is wondering whether in the future people will be smoking – or vaping – their medicine.

It’s a fair question because VitaCigs are apparently disposable, flavored electronic cigarettes with vitamins but with no nicotine.

‘The novel e-cig company offers five flavors: relax, refresh, energize, calm, and grace, writes Neal. ‘Each has basically the same vitamin content: A, B1, C, E, Coenzyme Q10, with small variations. In other words, the flavor names are pure marketing. “Relax” is a berry-flavored stick colored purple; “refresh” is green peppermint. You get the idea.’

The full story is at: http://motherboard.vice.com/read/e-cigarettes-now-with-vitamins.

LOGIC Technology has captured the number one position for volume sales of electronic cigarettes in US-wide convenience stores, according to a company press note citing Nielsen’s C-Track Database.

At the same time, the company has maintained its ‘strong hold’ on the number two position based on the value of sales across the US.

LOGIC currently accounts for 24.3 percent of volume sales and for 22.9 percent of the value of those sales.

“The latest Nielsen Brand Rank report further solidifies our place within this dynamic industry, and we are thrilled to claim the number one position for total US unit share,” said Miguel Martin, president of LOGIC, in announcing the figures.

The US-based electronic cigarette company LOGIC Technology said yesterday that it was expanding into the Canadian market through a partnership with Hilary’s Salesmaster.

Under the partnership agreement, LOGIC’s electronic cigarettes will be made available at more than 30,000 accounts operated by the distributor nationwide in Canada.

LOGIC’s products include both disposable and rechargeable versions and are available in traditional and menthol flavors.

The company is ranked number two in the US in respect of its dollar sales and its market share.

“We are excited to expand LOGIC’s distribution in Canada and are thrilled to be working with Hilary’s Salesmaster, a company with a vast footprint within the Canadian market,” said Miguel Martin, president of LOGIC. “We offer a premium product for adult consumers, as well as high margins for our retail and trade partners, and we are eager to meet the demand of consumers in Canada with our products.”

Since 1951, Hilary’s Salesmaster has developed a strong national presence in the Canadian retail market that currently reaches thousands of food, drug, mass, convenience, gas, food-service and hardware retailers.

“Hilary’s is excited to bring LOGIC to the Canadian marketplace,” said Stewart Ingles, president of Hilary’s Salesmaster.

“We have an extensive marketing campaign aimed at making LOGIC the number one brand in Canada.

“With our distribution and marketing skills, combined with the support of LOGIC Technology, we will strive to build LOGIC as the preeminent e-cig brand in Canada.”

More than half of UK businesses have no policy on the use of electronic cigarettes in the workplace, according to an International Business Times story citing research by the PMI Health Group.

The study, which questioned 216 personnel managers across large and medium sized UK companies, found that more than 58 percent of them ‘have yet to introduce a policy on electronic cigarette use’.

The research revealed also that 53 percent of employers were not concerned about staff vaping.

Seventy nine percent of the companies that have introduced electronic cigarette policies prohibit their use in all enclosed working environments, in line with cigarette smoking bans.

ITC is ready to enter the e-cigarette era and is engaging with the government in the hope of developing a policy that would allow the launch of these products on to the Indian market, according to a story in The Economic Times quoting chairman Y.C. Deveshwar.

The chairman said he expected that the new government would look favorably on the e-cigarette business and divulged that ITC was “ready with e-cigarettes.”

However, he said that some people wanted to ban these products in India.

And he warned that this could lead to a situation whereby, by the time it was established that e-cigarettes were less harmful than were tobacco cigarettes, foreign brands would be able to swamp the market, leaving Indian companies out in the cold.

The CECMOL forum 2014 will take place Sept. 2-4 at the Kirin Parkview Hotel in Shenzhen, China on. This is the first major international forum in China dedicated to the vapor market. Experts will discuss issues such as public policy, standardization, R&D and manufacturing.

This forum is an opportunity for visitors to meet China’s major e-cigarette and e-liquid manufacturers and major players in the global vapor industry. Among other things, visitors will learn more how the standards of safety, technologies, and production processes in China correspond with the standards of other regions.

The Chinese consumer market is gradually opening to the e-cigarette industry and may one day become the biggest vapor market in the world.

More information visit http://sf2014en.cecmol.com.

Forty percent of U.K. doctors believe that electronic cigarettes should be available only from pharmacies, according to a WalesOnline story quoting a recent poll.

Thirteen percent of doctors believe the devices should be prescription-only, 16 percent think they should not be on the market at all, and 31 percent believe they should be freely available.

These were the findings of a poll of 525 doctors conducted by Doctors.net.uk, an online network for U.K. doctors.

“I think e-cigarettes need to be regulated like a medicine and then be available as a pharmacy-only product,” said Dr James Quekett, a practising GP and director of educational services for Doctors.net.uk.

“This would bring them into line with nicotine replacement products.

“Since e-cigarettes are not currently regulated as medicines; we do not know exactly what is in them apart from nicotine. Therefore, while it might be assumed that e-cigarettes are safer than traditional cigarettes because they do not contain all the toxic elements of cigarette smoke, we do not know that for a fact, and we cannot advise patients on any long-term health implications.”

Dr Michael Blackmore, a retired GP, added: “E-cigarettes are undoubtedly safer than tobacco in terms of the cancer risk as there are no Benzo(a)pyrenes in the vapour. However, I am less sure about the cardiovascular risk which may be more closely related to nicotine.”

A survey last year of general practitioners (GPs) in the U.K. and Sweden revealed that many incorrectly identify nicotine as one of the most harmful components of cigarette smoke.

The survey findings showed that 40 percent of GPs believe nicotine to be the first or second riskiest component of cigarettes, incorrectly identifying it as more harmful than smoke. Many (44 percent in the U.K. and 56 percent in Sweden) also wrongly believed that nicotine in tobacco products was associated with cancer, while 15 percent in the U.K. and 22 percent in Sweden believed the same for pharmaceutical nicotine.

The results of last year’s survey, which was commissioned by British American Tobacco were published in a Harm Reduction special issue of ‘Drugs & Alcohol Today’, 2013, 13 (issue 2): www.emeraldinsight.com/journals.htm?issn=1745-9265&volume=13&issue=2