Tekcapital (TEK) said Innovative Eyewear Inc., a U.S. operating subsidiary of its portfolio company Lucyd Ltd, has submitted an application for a proposed IPO in the United States.

The UK intellectual property investment group,Tekcapital, currently owns 100% of the share capital of Lucyd Ltd and approximately 80% of the share capital of Innovative Eyewear, Inc.

In a statement released this morning, the Group said Innovative Eyewear has submitted a draft registration statement on a confidential basis with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for proposed initial public offering of shares of its common stock in the US.

The number of shares of common stock to be sold and the price range for the proposed IPO have not yet been determined, however, Innovative Eyewear said it intends to commence the IPO following completion of the SEC review process, subject to market and other conditions.

At this stage the Company said there can be no certainty on the IPO proceeding nor the terms or timing of the IPO and that further announcements will be made, as required, in due course.

Meanwhile, in a separate update this morning, Tekcapital said Innovative Eyewear, Inc., has now closed its crowdfund raising at approximately US$154,000. The Group chose to end the offering early as it believed it had already made substantial progress, Tekcapital explained.

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Last week, Tekcapital acknowledged a decision made by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to release voluntary sodium reduction goals for the food industry in what the Company described as “a major milestone” for its standing in the US market.

The new set of voluntary sodium reduction goals for the food industry will “provide measurable voluntary short-term (2.5-year) goals for sodium content in commercially processed, packaged, and prepared foods to reduce excess population sodium intake.”

Dr. Jennifer Ashton, Chief Medical Correspondent of broadcast network ABC News said the news “could be the biggest, most important intervention in a generation for public health.”

Tekcapital said this morning’s news marked ‘a significant milestone’ for its subsidiary company, Salarius, which develops and manufactures the proprietary low-sodium salt MicroSalt®. In particular, it believes the new set of US FDA guidelines will encourage snack food manufacturers to reduce the sodium levels in their products across the board.

London-listed Tekcapital owns 97.2% of the share capital of Salarius Ltd. and 87.1% of the share capital of MicroSalt Inc., its U.S. subsidiary.

Salarius anticipates the sodium reduction goals should have a positive impact on both business-to-business (B2B) sales of MicroSalt® and retail sales of SaltMe! Crisps.

As a result, Salarius said it believes that MicroSalt® as a brand “could be viewed as a timely, nationwide solution, to help food companies meet these guidelines without sacrificing the full-flavour of their snack foods, which is key to their successful on-going sales.”

MicroSalt develops a low-sodium salt called MicroSalt®. Its distinguishing feature is its small salt particles-- about one hundred times smaller than typical table salt-- that use a large surface area-to-volume ratio to generate a salty taste while using significantly less salt.

The particles of MicroSalt®, which is non-GMO and Kosher, are around 100 times smaller than table salt, allowing them to rapidly dissolve, producing a large sensation of saltiness. 

Decreasing the public’s sodium intake would aid the efforts to curtail heart disease, which according to the British Heart Foundation, causes more than a quarter, 27%, of all deaths in the UK; that’s more than 160,000 deaths each year – or one death every three minutes.

According to Market Researcher Future Market Insights, it is estimated that the sodium reduction market will be worth around $1.76 billion by 2025 with a CAGR of 11.8%.

Microsalt expects SaltMe! to become ‘a national brand’ in the low-sodium-full flavour snack category and that its e-commerce sales should be ‘positively impacted’, given a correlation between retail distribution, brand awareness, and expected increase in ecommerce sales.

It said MicroSalt® as a brand ‘could be elevated to a national-level ingredient,’ which it believes will encourage other food manufacturers to use MicroSalt® into their products.

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