Philip Morris International bets against conventional cigarettes: The tobacco giant applied to the US Food and Drug Administration seeking approval for its new tobacco vaporizer, the iQOS, reports Reuters. PMI says the device, which heats tobacco just enough to vaporize the active ingredients, has less than 10% of the harmful chemicals in cigarettes. The cost of developing the iQOS was around USD 3 bn, BBC reports. PMI CEO Andre Calantzopoulos says a time is approaching to start envisioning a phase out period for cigarettes. The most obvious competitor to the iQOS are e-cigarettes, but they only have a conversion rate of 20% with traditional smokers, he adds. Meanwhile, iQOS trials in Japan have retained 70% of the smokers who tried the alternative. Despite the growing publicity surrounding vaporizers and e-cigarettes, they remain a nascent technology that forms only a tiny part of tobacco firms’ income, writes Rob Davies for The Guardian.

UK-based rival British American Tobacco makes e-cigarettes under the Vype brand and this month launched a competitor to iQos called glo, but revenue from “next generation products” are still so small that the company does not disclose it, describing income from the division as “not currently material.”