The least-noticed part of the Ascenta Health Ltd. exit may be the most interesting: it is the development of a new company around the Ascenta Skin product.

Ascenta Health, whose NutraSea brand of nutritional products are made naturally from omega-3 fatty acids, said last month it had been bought by Nature’s Way, an affiliate of Dr. Willmar Schwabe Pharmaceuticals of Germany. And a single sentence in the announcement said Founder and CEO Marc St-Onge would “move on and retain ownership in Ascenta Skin, the company’s newly developed high-end skincare brand.”

Though the financial details of the sale to Nature’s Way were not disclosed, St-Onge did say in an interview Monday that there is no earn-out. That is, all the money was paid when the deal closed and the payment is not linked to the future performance of Ascenta Health.

St-Onge, who started Ascenta Health 12 years ago, is working as a part-time consultant to help Nature’s Way grow the Dartmouth operations. But otherwise he is free to grow Ascenta Skin as a new company.

Ascenta Skin now has annual revenue in the six-figure range and St-Onge believes it is now in a position to accelerate sales.

In 2009, St-Onge and his team became aware of scientific research showing that omega-3 EPA and DHA (the fatty oils found in such fish as salmon) not only have nutritional benefits for the heart and joints but can also benefit the skin. The studies showed that omega-3 can increase collagens and hydration in the skin and reduce redness and irritation.

So the company spent four years developing Ascenta Skin, which it launched in 2013. It also secured a $500,000 loan from the Atlantic Canada Opportunity Agency’s business development program to develop the product.

Ascenta Skin is taken orally, which is why its marketing campaign features the tagline, “Beauty comes from within.” St-Onge said the product can improve deeper layers of the skin than others that are applied externally.

With the new company, St-Onge and his five employees will continue to take a science-based approach to developing products and establishing their efficacy.  Ascenta Skin is the first product of its type approved by Health Canada, and the company last year completed human clinical trials establishing that Ascenta Skin can reduce sunburn.

“For us, really pioneering new research is part of what we’re looking to do,” said St-Onge, adding the company is now looking into research partnerships with universities. “We want to bring some new science to this process of skin care and anti-aging.”

What’s new about Ascenta Skin is it sells through a different sales channel than its mother company. The product sells through the high-end beauty outlets and spas, mainly in the U.S. and Canada. It has a Canadian distributer and the team is in talks on a similar arrangement in the U.S.

The young company will be financed internally at least in the initial stages. If Ascenta Skin launches a big project or wants to buy another company, it may need to raise capital in the future, said St-Onge. Ascenta Health in 2009 received a $4 million venture capital investment from Avrio Capital of Alberta.

For St-Onge, the new company brings with it the excitement and challenges he went through 12 years ago.

“It’s going to mean meeting some new challenges by virtue of the fact that we are selling into a new market,” he said. “But I think we can accelerate things faster than we did at Ascenta. The journey of an entrepreneur is always learning through trial and error and experience.”