Finding the sweet spot for taste, texture and nutritional profile is a challenge for beverage brands because consumer sentiments about desired product attributes are changing faster than ever.

In recent years, even as sucrose has continued to score at the top of consumers’ professed ingredient concerns, nutritive sweeteners and even plain sucrose have shed many of their unwarranted negative connotations to reassert their class as sweeteners of choice for a spectrum of food and beverage formulations.

According to a new market report published by Transparency Market Research "Alternative Sweetener Market - Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth and Forecast 2015 - 2021", global alternative sweetener market was valued at USD 11,538.6 million in 2014 and is expected to reach USD 15,466.7 million by 2021, growing at a CAGR of 4.2% from 2015 to 2021.

Driven by the global rise of obesity, diabetes, and other health concerns, alternative sweeteners have gained a 12% share of the $73.4 billion global market for sweeteners and 22% of its volume by sucrose equivalent (SE), according to Lux Research.