693 replies to this topic

[Major Legend]

I ordered a bottle of Niagen, my brain could use with the help to work out whats happening on this thread...

 

Is there anywhere I can read about the synthesis routes? Patent documents etc?

 

^ This seems like the most important thing to work out, its also quite cheap to get equipment in china, these are our options

 

1) Funding everything from crowdsourcing - probably more complicated than it sounds (due to alot of things being cheap but annoying to sort out in China its cheap for a reason lol), most importantly somebody needs to be able to work out how its done (could we pay a chemist on elance for example? But if we work this out than it could be a long term cheap supply for everyone.

2) Getting a fermentation plant to help us - problem seems to be volume?

3) Chemical Synthesis??? - problem is we don't know how and could be expensive

4) Supplier who "claims" to have riboside - seems the most simple, also I could probably get small samples if somebody can help me test it out. They may charge me for the small sample though.

5) Custom synthesis by external company - seems the best route, but can we get it cheaper than Niagen? Is this going to be cost prohibitive as well? If we provide the synthesis route, would the say company make us a small sample to test?

 

Next thing to work out is say if we did have a small sample from a supplier claiming to have the riboside - will somebody help with a spectrometer?

 

^ Because this seems to be a logistical problem in my simpleton brain damaged mind   , you would need to verify you have the real thing before taking people's money, or do I have it the wrong way around? 

 

Finally we need to work out the group buy price and participation - would it help better if I set up a site that can simply keep track of people who are interested? Or make a spreadsheet? Are we working in KGs? Should we have how much people want, and how much people are willing to pay for it? If we keep everything transparent would that help people see whats happening with the group buy?

 

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Regarding the lack of transparency in suppliers and custom synthesis its pretty simple:

 

1) People don't want suppliers to be overwhelmed or discovered by people with larger buying power to basically overtake the group buy and control

the supply chain.

2) There is probably a scarcity mentality as high tech cheap chinese manufacturers are probably not that many. You are talking about people with high level organic chemists and university level lab equipment at least, who are willing to do relatively low quantity and really cheap prices. 

3) There is commercial interest and value in supplier contact details, these contacts may have taken a while to find.

 

I don't have an opinion on transparency at the moment, we had this extended talk on another thread of NSI or PRL. I think I said something along the lines of as pioneers of being lab rats, we should get the privilege of having access to chemicals before the general public can get hold of them, and that this forum is read by a lot of people, probably many with ulterior motives than just self improvement - though I see the benefits of complete transparency too.

Edited by Major Legend, 01 May 2014 - 03:59 PM.

[Dstein]

and there is a Cheaper synthesis process than the standard one, so we'll see where prices come in at. the yeast fermentation even with continuous feed is not that efficient, 8 mg per liter of feed stock. Setting up the equipmemt for a run, when there is something else you can make with it for a sure profit, is not going to happen without prospects for massive volume and sales.
 

 

It's not  8 mg per liter of feed stock; it's a minimum of 8 mg/L of culture. The patent discusses nutrients for maximizing the yield. 

[midas]

 

 

 

 

When you look here it seems that it is possible under the right circumstances to get as much as 56mg from 1 litre with the correct fermentation process..Unless I am getting confused.

 

http://www.google.co...tents/US8114626

 

"Unexpectedly, by blocking NR uptake and salvage, the strain of this invention secretes at least 4.0 uM or 8 mg/L of nicotinamide riboside into the culture medium; a 40-fold increase over production of nicotinamide riboside in a wild-type strain. Furthermore, supplementation of the culture medium with either nicotinic acid or nicotinamide increases nicotinamide riboside production to as much as 7-8 μM, wherein even higher amounts of nicotinamide riboside are produced when the cells are cultured to extremely high densities. For example, S. cerevisiae grown to an OD_600nm of 60 in 2×YPD+5 mM NA was capable of producing 28 uM nicotinamide riboside."

 

 

 

 

and there is a Cheaper synthesis process than the standard one, so we'll see where prices come in at. the yeast fermentation even with continuous feed is not that efficient, 8 mg per liter of feed stock. Setting up the equipmemt for a run, when there is something else you can make with it for a sure profit, is not going to happen without prospects for massive volume and sales.
 

 

It's not  8 mg per liter of feed stock; it's a minimum of 8 mg/L of culture. The patent discusses nutrients for maximizing the yield. 

 

 

 

Yep, its 7 times that....."capable of producing 28 uM nicotinamide riboside" which comes out at 56mg per litre.

[Geoffrey1]

I ordered a bottle of Niagen, my brain could use with the help to work out whats happening on this thread...

 

Is there anywhere I can read about the synthesis routes? Patent documents etc?

 

^ This seems like the most important thing to work out, its also quite cheap to get equipment in china, these are our options

 

1) Funding everything from crowdsourcing - probably more complicated than it sounds (due to alot of things being cheap but annoying to sort out in China its cheap for a reason lol), most importantly somebody needs to be able to work out how its done (could we pay a chemist on elance for example? But if we work this out than it could be a long term cheap supply for everyone.

2) Getting a fermentation plant to help us - problem seems to be volume?

3) Chemical Synthesis??? - problem is we don't know how and could be expensive

4) Supplier who "claims" to have riboside - seems the most simple, also I could probably get small samples if somebody can help me test it out. They may charge me for the small sample though.

5) Custom synthesis by external company - seems the best route, but can we get it cheaper than Niagen? Is this going to be cost prohibitive as well? If we provide the synthesis route, would the say company make us a small sample to test?

 

Next thing to work out is say if we did have a small sample from a supplier claiming to have the riboside - will somebody help with a spectrometer?

 

^ Because this seems to be a logistical problem in my simpleton brain damaged mind   , you would need to verify you have the real thing before taking people's money, or do I have it the wrong way around? 

 

Finally we need to work out the group buy price and participation - would it help better if I set up a site that can simply keep track of people who are interested? Or make a spreadsheet? Are we working in KGs? Should we have how much people want, and how much people are willing to pay for it? If we keep everything transparent would that help people see whats happening with the group buy?

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Regarding the lack of transparency in suppliers and custom synthesis its pretty simple:

 

1) People don't want suppliers to be overwhelmed or discovered by people with larger buying power to basically overtake the group buy and control

the supply chain.

2) There is probably a scarcity mentality as high tech cheap chinese manufacturers are probably not that many. You are talking about people with high level organic chemists and university level lab equipment at least, who are willing to do relatively low quantity and really cheap prices. 

3) There is commercial interest and value in supplier contact details, these contacts may have taken a while to find.

 

I don't have an opinion on transparency at the moment, we had this extended talk on another thread of NSI or PRL. I think I said something along the lines of as pioneers of being lab rats, we should get the privilege of having access to chemicals before the general public can get hold of them, and that this forum is read by a lot of people, probably many with ulterior motives than just self improvement - though I see the benefits of complete transparency too.

quick post as i'm off to work. You have probably already PM'd Maxwatt as you are both invaluable. You right there (HK i think) and Maxwatt with his knowledge and connections in China as well as yours (for example he has someone who is using a cheaper approach to making synthetic than the quotes i have gotten which have been very high for synthetic.) 

So if i may: please do PM Maxwatt so you are not duplicating each others efforts  on all of our behalf. 

Other points well made

 

there have been 3 links to patents on the thread but if you do not have time to look back someone will post them here i am sure. Patent pending not actually  patent so Basically CD wrote an instruction manuel for a fermentaion person in China to follow. Nice of them . And 2 more patent pending describing as well for our China connection to be to follow.

[APBT]

there have been 3 links to patents on the thread but if you do not have time to look back someone will post them here i am sure. Patent pending not actually  patent so Basically CD wrote an instruction manuel for a fermentaion person in China to follow. Nice of them . And 2 more patent pending describing as well for our China connection to be to follow.

 

Here's the link to the Chromadex NR patents.  Click around on their site, there's lots of information.
https://chromadex.co...ts/Patents.html

[pleiotropic]

I have registered as a company with Chromadex, inorder to see their pricing and perhaps order

At a minimum I could get one gram for HPLC testing, but perhaps I can see their pricing for 20 - 50 kilo amunts.

 

I assume they are suppliers to Niagen.  One interesting bit is they sell the sodium anion of NR.  But in the amounts some are considering using, that will be a lot of sodium.

 

Is this a health concern?  If adequate sodium intake is around 600-900mg/day.  How much would taking 3-4 grams of the sodium anion of NR add?  We probably don't want excess sodium in our diet.  What other options are available if it is a concern?

[pleiotropic]

 

 

I have registered as a company with Chromadex, inorder to see their pricing and perhaps order

At a minimum I could get one gram for HPLC testing, but perhaps I can see their pricing for 20 - 50 kilo amunts.

 

I assume they are suppliers to Niagen.  One interesting bit is they sell the sodium anion of NR.  But in the amounts some are considering using, that will be a lot of sodium.

 

Is this a health concern?  If adequate sodium intake is around 600-900mg/day.  How much would taking 3-4 grams of the sodium anion of NR add?  We probably don't want excess sodium in our diet.  What other options are available if it is a concern?

 

 

 

 

Potassium.

 

 

Still have to monitor potassium intake.  Exceeding normal levels can lead to cardiac arrest.

[Major Legend]

Ok, I've been making some headway on this, i think companies are cautious taking up something unknown and potentially patented. Will be back with more information soon. There are a lot of foreign buyers looking to get this chemical too, from what I heard - pioneer has managed to dupe a few people with the red stuff.

 

Can people who are interested (or any additional) post how much they would be interested too?

 

I must admit I treading on very unknown territory with "group buys". It is scaring me a bit.

 

I think before we attempt to go ahead we should make a few things clear:

 

1) I will do my best to ensure the supplier is for real.

2) Analysis by the lab is possible, but it would be great if somebody from a university can volunteer to analyse the sample, I don't even think we should go ahead with this until we can find "this person". 

3) No matter what, it seems (for the moment anyways) a custom synthesis route would not allow us to procure a sample before fronting up half the cash, as a "deposit" that we "should" get back if the chemical isn't as stated.

 

Will post more information when I know more.

 

I also found out that patents do not seem to actually apply internationally, which puts me in the safe zone, as long as the entire ordeal is kept private. Unfortunately due to the legalities of the situation - I will keep certain information private to myself and the group.

 

So I need to work out our order quantity right now, so I can feed that information out. I'll make a spreadsheet of sorts.

 

 

Edited by Major Legend, 08 May 2014 - 08:59 AM.

[Major Legend]

 

 

I never ordered from them but they seem a trust worthy company. It's one of the biggest in China with a good reputation. Everybody is taking a risk, that’s a fact. If the product is not pure enough than you've thrown away your money. That’s the risk you'll be taking (we all are). If you can find a supplier with no risk who can deliver for the same price, great; it's okay. I only found companies who ask for around 2000$ for a kilo, which is insane. As I see it; it’s a risk worth taking. I’m not selling anything here. I’m not making a profit if we do the group buy. And secondly the first 25kg will be for 80$ a kilo, which is the price they will give me. The normal price is 100$ a kilo. I’m not responsible for the way this group buy goes. I already invested a lot of time in finding a supplier and negotiating. I arranged that they weigh and pack it in ear sealed bags for free. I’ve done my part.

Thank you for all your efforts. People need to understand that group buys are generally very high risk but also high potential reward. People running these are usually getting nothing out of it and taking on risk (particularly to their reputation).

Do you know if they will agree to ship to Australia?

 

Also +1 for Australia, otherwise we'd have to use a reshipper such as skypax or whatever. I'm still in for a kilo assuming the shipping cost is still reasonable to Australia. (It should be China is closer to Australia than America)

 

 

As someone with some shipping experience, there is not much difference in cost. Australia is about as far as Europe or the US, the world map is not drawn in correct scale. If anything it will be more expensive, with the US generally being the cheapest in my experience due to the sheer volume of things flying/shipped to and from the US, and the availability of far better services.

 

I could be wrong though, I haven't exactly made a list.

[Major Legend]

Sorry - forget the comment about posting if you are still interested. I will assume people who posted before are still interested.

 

Note: finding an external testing person/equipment is a MUST before we proceed. Otherwise I won't even consider the group buy as there would be no way I can know for sure if we are sending out the right.

 

I am on page 7 on the thread, trying to go through it all. There are ALOT of people wanting to buy - I am a bit worried about having to pack and ship all the material myself, and like somebody else mentioned, I don't think Chinese companies would be comfortable having to ship out individual bags, but I could be wrong about that.

 

We may have to limit the size of the group buy somewhat. I also do not have equipment to weigh out the the quantities exactly and cleanly either.  If logistics becomes a problem - are there any volunteers to lead the distribution - per country? Still need a candidate who will volunteer to test the initial synthesis - par matrix? smithx? another chinese company who can perform spectroscopy?

 

 

 

[midas]

I think the amount people are going to want to buy is going to depend on the cost of the product. So it would be difficult to commit to an amount without knowing how much.

[nbourbaki]

I think the amount people are going to want to buy is going to depend on the cost of the product. So it would be difficult to commit to an amount without knowing how much.

 

I agree completely.  We know how much Niagen is and the discounted price for the group Niagen buy.  We know it's pure and it's easy to get.  The economics and quality of product will drive how many will want to participate.

[PWAIN]

In response to Major Legends question about qty people want to buy, I think I'll just say I am willing to spend around $300 to $500. Qty is hard to estimate when price is not known.

[maxwatt]

I too have seen progress on the supply side.  A state-owned pharmaceutial company has acquired the raw materials - they said they are not cheap - and is proceeding with a test-synthesis of a smaller quantity before attempting a larger batch.  They will be offering me a sample for testing.  They have asked me for a reference standard sample for their HPLC calibration.  A gram from Sigma Aldrich for that purpose would cost $400, I estimate.  The last HPLC standard I sent to China was damaged in customs.  Even without a reference sample, HPLC can establish the purity of the predominant molecule, and we can determine molecular weight.  In what lab, I do not know, but there are several we can pay if there is no chemist here who can do this.  A member with a mass spectrometer who tested my last sample, can probably do so again and establish identity.

 

As long as we are limiting the group buy to members and registered users, I believe this gets around any patents, as one is allowed to use a patent for personal, non-commercial use. And the Chinese are unlikely to honor or enforce any foreign patent, so they can produce it.  If ML is receiving a bulk shipment and repacking, and taking something for his labor, that is legitimate to pay for this service as part of acquiring for personal use.  The Chinese pack things in standard one kilogram sealed bags, so ML's effort will be reduced if the minimum group order quantity is 1 kilogram.  Those wanting lesser amounts can pool their resources.

Edited by maxwatt, 08 May 2014 - 06:39 PM.

[midas]

 

 

I find the price of $80 a kilo to Major Legend suspiciously low, unless I am greatly underestimating the cost of raw materials. 

 

I missed that, where did you see he said $80 a kilo?

[maxwatt]

 

 

 

I find the price of $80 a kilo to Major Legend suspiciously low, unless I am greatly underestimating the cost of raw materials. 

 

I missed that, where did you see he said $80 a kilo?

 

He did not say that, I've edited it out of my post - I was confused by a quote he was making of rumplestiltskin in an earlier post.
 

[Major Legend]

Sounds good Max, you may hit the jackpot before me. ^^

 

Prefer it to be sent to Hong Kong , the CIF quote for Hong Kong.  I would think trying to move 25 to 30kgs worth of "powder" from my Chinese office into Hong Kong or abroad would raise a few eyelids at a company who has never done that kind of trading before, you know I don't want to be flagged or arrested or anything. Hong Kong post is a lot more lax.

 

For reference here is the list of people signed on this group by at the moment (I have only put down those people who I assume would be interested in 1kg. I believe the acceptable price range at the moment is anywhere from $100usd to $200usd)

 

This list is in chronological order of people who posted on this thread:

 

3AlarmLampScooter

Hebbeh

Trance

Werper

Nattzor

Mait

PWAIN

gnappi

maxwatt

dstein

baronjpetor

pleitropic

nbourbaki

kenj

masterherb

iporuru

uralsky

aarfai

mpe

alex921

muad'dib

Megatron

Overman

Rumpelstiltskin

Colli

Meatsauce

extiron

opaquemind

saxiephon

Izan82

Bigpapachakra

bug

debu

Mitochondria

Mr.Happy

Concestor0

hermes

adaptogen

explorador

Bobseitz

Ashenhurts

medicineman

Geoffrey1

Light

Slotviite

Seescaper

prophets

Mikey

CryonicsCulture

 

Thats 51 people = 51kg? People who want to be off the list if they bought Niagen in the other group buy please indicate.

Edited by Major Legend, 08 May 2014 - 05:46 PM.

[logan113]

Please Major Legend can you put me in this list

[midas]

You forgot to put me on the list.

[ParMatrix]

I will rescan and upload the results first thing in the morning! Message me if we find another supplier you guys want me to get a sample from!

[malbecman]

 I'd like to be added to that list as well if possible.   Thanks!

[Light]

I am still interested, although I wanted to purchase as much as 1 kg only when I thought the price would be cheaper. As others have mentioned, I may have to adjust that amount depending on the final price.

[mikey]

 

I've not found a legitimate supplier in China - we have one case of red rice yeast, another plain old nicotinamide being passed off as nicotinamide ribocide.  That doesn't mean there is not a source, but it is liable to be expensive.  I was quoted 17,000 a kilo by a trustworthy fellow I know, so his source was probably 9000 a kilo or so, if he really had a source yet. 

 

 

 

 

I don't get how that works, even at $9,000 that is still $3,700 more expensive per Kg than if you bought a Kg of Niagen ($4400 a Kg........@ $33 a bottle @ 7.5 grams a bottle)

So who in their right mind would be asking $17,000 a kilo never mind $9,000 when you can buy it legitimately for a lot less?
 

I dont honestly thing they will be that bothered about method of manufacture patents in China, after all the end result cant be patented?

 

 

I haven't been following this formum closely enough to know about pricing.

 

Chromadex sells it for $1,400/kg.

 

They are very specific about who they sell to as they are seeking big companies to take it exclusively into a given market.

 

Thorne Research already has locked up exclusivity in the doctor's market.

 

I might be able to buy it through my research company, telling them that it isn't going into public circulation, and won't offend any of their potential markets, because its destination is a buyer's club.

Edited by mikey, 09 May 2014 - 07:15 PM.

[Major Legend]

You forgot to put me on the list.

 

Lol, sorry, its because the opt ins are mixed with all the general Nicotinamide Riboside talk.

[telight]

Major Legend, please put me down for 1Kg. Thank you for efforts in this group buy.

[midas]

 

 

You forgot to put me on the list.

 

Lol, sorry, its because the opt ins are mixed with all the general Nicotinamide Riboside talk.

 

 

No worries, as long as I end up on the list I'll be happy

[YOLF]

$1400/kg sounds pretty expensive. How long would that much last a person?

[Major Legend]

$1400/kg sounds pretty expensive. How long would that much last a person?

 

Thats Chromadex's price, we should be able to get it alot cheaper.

[YOLF]

Do we have an estimate? I'd still like to know how much of this stuff I need to take.

[tiadan]

I'd like to be on the list as well, please.

What do we suppose the shelf life of this stuff is?