NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - A Dallas woman has received a clone of her dead cat after paying $50,000 to a California biotech company, a Texas newspaper reported.

The first cloned-to-order pet sold in the United States is named Little Nicky.

The Dallas Morning News reported Wednesday that the cloned kitten, dubbed Little Nicky, was born in Austin and presented to a Texas woman named Julie who was saddened by the loss of the cat, also named Nicky, she had owned for 17 years.

The copied cat -- about 8 weeks old -- was delivered to Julie on Dec. 10. It is the first ever cloned-to-order pet sold in the United States, the newspaper said.

Genetic Savings & Clone, the company behind Little Nicky's cloning, said the Texas resident stored her old cat's tissue in its gene bank, according to the report. And when Genetic Savings offered clients the chance to reproduce their precious pets for a price, Julie signed up.

Genetic Savings is the only company to offer cloned pets to paying customers, and five people have signed up this year for what it calls its "Nine Lives Extravaganza" -- the chance to clone a cat for $50,000, company spokesman Ben Carlson told the paper.

The company has not released Julie's last name but reports that the airline industry employee is pleased with her new pet, according to the paper.

Her previous cat died at age 17 last year, according to the article.