IFF returns to the Leaders & Newsmakers issue for 2024 with segment leaders to highlight strides in various markets and influencers for innovation. The company also doubles down on its commitment to a sustainable future and shares forward-looking goals.
IFF
New York, New York
2023 Sales: $11.5 billion
Erik Fyrwald, CEOcourtesy of IFF
Erik Fyrwald, CEO
As a chemical engineer, I've always been drawn to companies that leverage science and creativity for a better world. That's why, when I joined IFF as CEO in February, I was already an admirer of the Company's rich history, reputation as an innovative powerhouse, and commitment to sustainability. I believe in the power of the natural sciences to create sustainable solutions, and I'm proud to lead a company that shares this vision.
Since taking on the role of CEO, I've made it a priority to immerse myself in our operations and connect with our employees and customers in every region. This hands-on approach has deepened my admiration for this company and our work. I've witnessed firsthand the passion and dedication that drives our innovation and sustainability efforts, and it's truly inspiring.
Customers are Our Focus
Our commitment to sustainability is not just a buzzword; it's a core part of our business strategy. Led by our robust innovation platform and research and development pipeline, we deeply value our customer partnerships. We are committed to helping them achieve their ESG goals and sustainability targets. This includes striving for all new IFF innovations to have a sustainability value proposition supportive of people and planet by 2030. As of 2023, a significant percentage of our new projects already meet that criterion, as affirmed by our proprietary Innovation for Sustainability model. Today, R&D is embedded within our business units, further bolstering the intimate connection between our pipeline and the needs of our customers. We also have a 2030 goal to enable customers to save 50 times more CO2e than generated at our manufacturing sites. We are working toward this through the delivery of our products, which often lower environmental impacts through their performance during the use phase, demonstrating our commitment to sustainability throughout the product lifecycle.
Innovation is in Our DNA
Being an innovation powerhouse means constantly reassessing and continually evolving our approach. We strive to protect the environment and safeguard human health, from responsibly sourcing and using our input materials more efficiently to promoting circularity and reducing upstream and downstream impacts.
We can positively influence sustainability across the entire value chain by leveraging our unique combination of partnerships, technologies, and capabilities. Beginning at the source, we strive to promote regenerative ecosystems and equitably support our workers and grower communities by conducting rigorous human rights risk assessments in our strategic supply chains. We also work with various stakeholders and local communities to responsibly harvest seaweed in support of marine conservation—a commitment we’ve been involved in for more than 60 years—which was recently underscored by a new partnership to restore seaweed forests in northern Norway.
At the product level, we actively listen to our customers and work to win along with them. For example:
- Through programs such as Re-Imagine Waste, we create new upcycled concepts, launch certified upcycled products, and strive to prevent waste through new food protection innovations. The 2023 launch of NOVAGARD NN 1-10, a naturally occurring antimicrobial and antifungal blend, offers a cost-effective alternative to synthetic preservatives while potentially extending product shelf life and enabling less frequent product distribution, resulting in a lower carbon footprint related to transportation.
- Our proprietary Designed Enzymatic Biomaterialsa (DEB) technology is a revelation that uses advanced biotechnology to create a new-to-the-world class of biobased polysaccharides that enable more sustainable products without compromising performance. We celebrated the launch of the first personal care ingredient enabled by DEB in 2023 with AURISTb AGC – a water-soluble, readily biodegradable conditioning biopolymer comprised of natural and nature-inspired ingredients to deliver various applications.
We Drive Operational Excellence for People & Planet
Together, we are continually progressing for more and better, including our commitment to diversity and gender parity. One of our recent DEI recognitions includes being named the top U.S. Company for gender equality and tenth globally by Equileap. We are proud to have already closed our overall mean, unadjusted gender pay gap, and we continue to work toward gender balance across our workforce. This extends to a focus on gender representation in our succession planning and the incorporation of diversity considerations in recruiting.
Another way we ensure the well-being of our people is to continuously improve our safety program and strive to achieve an incident-free workplace. We made good progress this year, with a decrease in our total recordable incident rate for the second year in a row against our 2021 baseline.
As we look to further our commitment to climate and planetary health, we focus on lightening our footprint across our manufacturing operations. We also lead on urgent climate action and aspire towards our science-based target of reducing our absolute direct and indirect GHG emissions by 50% below 2021 levels by 2030.
We also continued to advance toward reaching Zero Waste to Landfill (ZWL) status at all our major manufacturing plants worldwide. When I started earlier this year, I had the pleasure to visit some of these sites that achieved internal ZWL verification last year, adding to our growing list of ZWL-verified locations around the world.
I am excited to support employees as they push our boundaries daily to achieve our ambitious goals and advance our innovation pipeline to best serve our customers’ needs. In 2024, we will continue capitalizing on our investment in bioscience and unparalleled scale-up capacity to accelerate the shift to climate-neutral, more sustainable solutions. To achieve these goals, we collaborate and connect with our suppliers, partners, customers, and other valued stakeholders to ensure we progress annually and prepare for the future. Here's to achieving more together in 2024!
Yuvraj Arora, president, Nourishcourtesy of IFF
Yuvraj Arora, president, Nourish
What are your leading focuses and goals for the next 12 months?
Yuvraj Arora [YA]: We’re always striving to nourish people, products, and the planet. As stated in our Do More Good Plan, our environmental, social, governance, plus Sustainable Solutions (or ESG+) roadmap, we have a 2030 goal for all new innovations to have a sustainability value proposition that supports people and planet. This includes advancements such as health and wellbeing products, solutions for sustainable food systems, and circular economy strategies. We’ll continue to build on our progress in reducing food waste and upcycling, lowering carbon footprints, practicing sustainable growing and production, and more.
We'll grow our modulation capabilities to meet consumer demands for healthier products that still taste indulgent. These capabilities help customers develop delicious recipes with lower sugar, salt, and/or fat and mask off-notes. We’re also addressing mental well-being as we continue to work on unique flavors that support mood management.
In addition to showcasing new and exciting tastes, textures, and experiences, we create solutions that benefit all. As the cost of living increases, we’re innovating for consumers by developing flavors with cost-effective tools and working to extend shelf life and stability—supporting our sustainability goals.
Can you share three key company highlights for the last 12 months?
YA: In 2023-24, we expanded and enhanced several of our flavor creation labs around the globe and opened two new co-creation centers in South Korea and the Netherlands. This spring, we also celebrated the completion of our state-of-the-art Citrus Innovation Center, resulting from an exciting partnership with Florida Polytechnic University. We’re fostering a transformative holistic citrus development ecosystem that supports global citrus research and development.
The center will help us co-create with the university, customers, and partners and develop breakthrough citrus solutions for the Food & Beverage and Scent industries. In addition, we’ll be able to more effectively leverage our citrus insights and solutions, like IFF NEOc, our natural flavor collection entirely free of citrus-derived molecules, fractions, and oils.
We’ve made significant advancements in taste modulation. This year, we’ve introduced a range of new taste modulation technologies that empower our flavorists to further refine sugar reduction and mask off notes. Modulation was also key to creating CREMODANd GREENPRO 101—launched in 2023—which can lower recipe costs by up to 25% and the carbon footprint of ingredients used in ice cream by up to 30% by helping manufacturers reduce the milk solids and fat content of ice cream without impacting its perceived indulgent quality.
In addition, we continue to nourish people through our longstanding relationship with Jon Bon Jovi Soul Kitchen, community restaurants in New Jersey that serve those in need. We volunteered our services to create a Soul Seasonings line; recently, Bon Jovi himself announced the release of new seasonings we worked on.
What are the major influencers for innovation in 2024 leading into 2025?
YA: With Panoptic—our proprietary trend intelligence approach—we’ve identified several trends or “Lifestyle Movements” that significantly impact how people live and consume:
- Affordability: Simple Frugality: Consumers are reevaluating their priorities, making more thoughtful choices, seeking products with values that align with theirs, using fewer resources, and spending less money. Because of this, purpose-driven products, discounts and perks, and private-label options are increasing in popularity.
- Health: Better Being and Sustainability: Responsible Living: There’s an ever-increasing focus on self-care, mental well-being, natural healing, moral and social responsibility, and eco-consciousness. This means companies need to provide products that are better for people and the planet, emphasizing nutrition, carbon footprint reduction, and upcycling.
- Experience: Neo-Hedonism: Consumers are looking for new ways to enjoy life, and companies can meet this need with innovative, sensorial taste experiences and unexpected flavors. This trend is relevant for many categories where consumers seek unique products that engage the senses—like ice cream and dairy desserts, beverages, salty snacks, and bakeries.
- AI Digital: AI Human: AI technologies, while enhancing personalization and speed, need validation and proof of improvement. They serve as catalysts in the food and beverage sectors, augmenting human skills and connections. We deploy Generative AI and Deep Learning models at IFF to increase our best-in-class domain expertise. We’re developing an AI-based decision support tool to better and more quickly identify new pathways to upcycle food side streams—one of the many examples of our dedication to innovation, sustainability, and efficiency.
Ana Paula Mendonça, president, Scentcourtesy of IFF
Ana Paula Mendonça, president, Scent
Can you share three key company highlights for the last 12 months?
Ana Paula Mendonça [APM]: IFF strives to reduce the environmental impact of our ingredients, fragrances, and portfolio. The complexity of fragrance design requires dynamic IT systems to manage and track improvements regarding the environmental impact of our ingredients. IFF has incorporated tools to transform bills of materials to life cycle data and connect this to business data to enable in-depth analysis of fragrances and customer metal formulas. IFF has also incorporated this LCA data into our perfumers’ design tool. With this life cycle data at their fingertips, IFF perfumers can add mindful design to their toolbox as they continue to develop superior fragrances while meeting customer sustainability needs and targets.
LMR Renewable Extracts Collection comprises five absolutes obtained with 100% bio-sourced and biodegradable solvents, with many more currently in development. As a responsible fragrance ingredient manufacturer, these renewable absolutes offer a re-interpretation of classic absolutes known for decades. What is new? They reveal the hidden olfactory facets of the extracted flowers that can now be exploited in fragrance creation. While the main objective of this collection is to reduce environmental impact, we are finding new applications, such as cosmetics, where these new absolutes provide advantageous benefits over conventional absolutes. This will offer a bright future for these new sustainable ingredients.
In 2023, as part of our efforts to lead the regenerative agenda, we invested in the expansion of our biodegradation testing facility to accelerate the development of biodegradable Scent Solutions, delivering best-in-class fragrances while meeting the Scent business unit’s ambition and our customers' ESG goals. With this new capability, our Ingredients Synthesis Team targets intrinsically biodegradable molecules in parallel with the desired hedonics and performance. The output of our internal testing will, over time, improve the existing predictive models, allowing Scent molecules to be confidently assessed for their biodegradation even before being synthesized. Ultimately, this will result in a Scent Creative Catalogue that includes the next generation of biodegradable linear, high-volume specialty ingredients that enable creative differentiation.
IFF ECOCAPS is our first-to-market responsibly designed scent delivery system designed first for fabric softener and powder detergent applications, which offers:
- A broader olfactive freedom to deliver consumers new scent experiences.
- A better cost-in-use performance across washing stages, from wet to dry laundry.
- Significantly improved sustainability credentials fostering positive impact.
In April this year, Puig launched a Charlotte Tilbury fragrance collection that unlocks the full power of the IFF Science of Wellness, including 40 years of research leveraging IFF neurosciences and AI.
What are your main company focuses and/or goals for the next 12 months?
APM: We will continue to expand our presence in targeted growth regions. This will be demonstrated by the opening of state-of-the-art Scent creative centers in Shanghai and Dubai later this year.
We continue to invest in the talents of tomorrow through the IFF Shiftan perfumery school and our joint perfumery school program with ISIPCA. This allows us to train perfumers, scent designer managers, and scent experts, increasing diversity and serving all regions.
Aligned with our customer needs, we will continue to drive product superiority with our key Innovation platforms, such as:
- Novel sustainable ingredients and delivery systems,
- Modulation leveraging new biotech capabilities,
- Novel natural ingredients by our LMR team,
- Health & wellness solutions, i.e., successful METASLEEPe product range
- And the acceleration of our digital capabilities
Finally, our ambition is to continue our above-market growth.
What are the major influencers for innovation in 2024 leading into 2025?
APM: We use our internal Panoptic trend research tool to drive innovation. Here are three select trends identified as being major influencers for IFF innovation:
- BETTER-BEING: People are adopting a pragmatic approach to health, focusing on more innovative ways to optimize their health and enhance how they look and feel. They seek more practical and natural options that deliver instant enhancements and proven results, shifting away from time-consuming, complex, expensive, or exclusionary solutions. They are increasingly relying on the latest scientific and technological advancements to achieve their desired outcomes, and AI is changing the game by making personalized health and wellness affordable. Health and well-being are integrated with every aspect of their lives and interconnected with their world. Living longer is no longer enough; people also want to live better. The increasing focus on being healthy as we age drives the demand for offerings tailored to an older population, more tech-savvy and affluent, who want to enjoy a more active and independent life. The IFF Science of Wellness program and our internally developed AI tool, CODEX, allow us to respond to this growing trend.
- RESPONSIBLE LIVING: Alarmed by the disastrous consequences of the climate crisis, people are increasingly committing more to the planet and investing more time and money to find new ways to live sustainably and create a regenerative future. Eco-ethical values are now paramount: it is about becoming responsible citizens of the world for the planet and the people living on it. While information is increasingly questioned, people seek greater transparency, honesty, and trusted sources for products, solutions, and responses to political, moral, social, environmental, health, and safety issues. IFF is deeply committed to delivering on these expectations, with the ambitious catalog transformation program mentioned above and human rights and social impact commitments.
- NEO-HEDONISM: Consumers are expanding their definition of hedonism, seeking new and innovative ways to experience pleasure, infusing the every day with joy and sensorial delights. They want surprise, mystery, awe, and wonder, making new experiences that engage a broad spectrum of feelings and emotions. While financial challenges remain, they are self-gifting with creative, affordable treats, accessible pleasures, and new forms of indulgence where they seek meaningful and healthy experiences rather than excess and extravagance. They are cherishing new, simple, daily practices and pampering rituals that help them rejoice and counteract their lingering anxiety and unhappiness. With an expanded Science of Wellness program, which looks at understanding the connections between scent and the senses (colors, and now sound thanks to a unique partnership with IRCAM Amplify sound research startup), IFF is providing perfumers with new tools to cater to the quest for neo-hedonism. The IFF La Fabrica program also gives perfumers around the world a platform for creation in collaboration with world-leading artists such as Kong Jeu A at the Korean Biennale Pavilion with Odorama Cities, featuring ten IFF perfumers from around the world; Dominique Ropion and Vacheron Constantin and art director Yiqing Yin; Nicole Mershon and artist Delcy Morelos with Cielo terrenal and El Abrazo at New York Dia Foundation and more, providing a playground for increased olfactive expressions.
