Shark is a Thai energy drink, made in Austria, sold by Thai company.
Red Bull is a Thai energy drink, made in Austria and Thailand, sold by an Austrian company and a Thai company.
Note the difference?
So what is going on here? Actually I am not sure, but here is what I can work out so far. Enlightenment is welcomed from those more knowledgeable on this than myself.
Shark is a true competitor of Red Bull I believe, but it is difficult to sort out from the information available on the web who EXACTLY makes (as in manufactures) Shark.
History: both the Thai original of Red Bull, Krating Daeng (Red Guar - looks like a bull IS a bull in my book) and Shark are allegedly based on the health drink Kilane, first created by a chemist in Bangkok over a hundred years ago during a severe crisis of Bangkok Belly.
Osotspa is the Thai company that devolved from the original producers of that drink, but it imports the product they call Shark from Austria: significantly, hmmm? Osotspa also introduced into Thailand Lipovatin, one of the other direct precusors of Red Bull, from Japan in the mid 1960's.
However the Thai drink Red Guar (Bull) is not made by Osotspa but by the Thai company T.C. Pharmaceuticals. Significantly, there is no mention of Red Bull in the Osotspa or Shark websites. T.C. Pharma get 49% of the world-wide sales of Red Bull BTW. Sigh. And they thought they were doing pretty well in Thailand up till that time...
Also there is no information to directly connect Osotspa with now-billionaire Dietrich Mateschitz, the Salzburger who took Red Bull from Thailand to the world. He made his deal with T.C. Pharma. Or is it just hidden in a buzz of caffeine, taurine (NOT from bulls' testicles), choline bitartrate and arginine - not to mention all that vodka?
So why is Shark made in Austria, if it is not being churned out by the Red Bull factories?
Is everything joined in one great headachey-spinning conspiracy in this world or what?
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Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krating_Daeng
http://www.osotspa.com/ (check the Heritage section)
http://www.sharkusa.com/about-shark/shark-energy-history.aspx
http://www.redbullextra.com/ (in Thai, the T.C. Pharma product)
Friskodude started me on this epic research effort (which has forced me to skip [delay] dinner), by linking to ThaiPulse who raised the question about Shark and Red Bull being exactly the same drink.
E@L
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8 comments:
good marketing strategy perhaps... be your own competitor, provide an alternative before someone else does....
ok, but do they taste good? or are they different from each other? or is this just a marketing sos/dd, sugar? xoxoxo
Marke: but I doubt Osotspa and TC Pharma get along, they've been in competition for ages.
Sav: I try not to drink RB because of the my blood pressure and the glucose levels (sugar being the operative word, sugar), except maybe at 3am when I need a charge to get me through those spooky, David-Lynch-dream hours just before dawn in the bars of Wanchai.
You realise this all because some Thai general felt he was not getting his cut.
Did you guys mix your vodkas with Red Bull/Shark? :D
I just discovered that the energy drink sold by ALDI is also made in Austria.
And I just had an energy drink, with my curry chicken noodles for lunch, called "Naughtie G Cola"...
Makes you powerful, said the sales lady, which is the usual way of not-saying that it is an aphrodisiac and will give you wood. The L-arginine they call the miracle molecule in this drink is an amino-acid that in combination with oxygen reacts with the precusor vasodilator e-nitric oxide synthase (eNOS) to create actual vasodilation in a simple sequence of events; O2 + L-arginin + eNOS -> L-citruline and NO -> guanlyl cyclase -> GTP -> cyclic-GMP and... 'abracadabra' the arterial wall muscle relaxes which increases blood flow.
As you all are no doubt are aware, normally have enough L-arginine in your system and the problem is the lack of supply of eNOS, as it is snaffled up by free radicals or the endothelium itself is damaged and doesn't produce enough eNOS, etc... so I'm not sure how adding extra L-arginine will help.
But as they used say about water in Get Smart: (shrugs) It wouldn't hurt.
Same goes for the Horny Goat Weed, also in this drink.
Oh yeah, and it is made in Austria too!
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