Firmenich Reinforces its Commitment to China by Appointing Most Senior Perfumery Leader, Paul Andersson, as New China President

Geneva, Switzerland, April 29 2019 – Reinforcing its commitment to China, Firmenich appoints Paul Andersson as President Firmenich China, effective immediately. In this new capacity, Andersson will relocate to Shanghai, China, to accelerate the Group’s expansion in its second largest market worldwide.

“Firmenich has great ambitions in China,” says Gilbert Ghostine, Firmenich CEO. “Lately we have been accelerating our strategic investments here, as reflected by our partnerships with Layn and ArtSci, and most recently the launch of our largest Flavor plant in the world in Zhangjiagang. With Paul’s outstanding leadership credentials and strong business partnerships developed over the past 35 years, he is the right leader to take Firmenich’s innovation and excellence to new heights for our customers across China.”

“Having spent over 7 years in Asia during my career, I am excited to be moving to Shanghai to lead a new chapter of innovation and expansion for Firmenich in China’s thriving and highly digitally-savvy market,” says Paul Andersson. “I look forward to mobilizing our unique set-up in China, cutting across leading Research, Creativity, Commercial and Production facilities and expertise, to shape locally-relevant and highly differentiating technologies for Chinese consumers.”

Paul Andersson, President, Firmenich China

Having worked for Firmenich over the past 35 years, Paul brings a deep industry understanding to his new role. Throughout his outstanding career with Firmenich, Paul took on roles of increasing responsibility across commercial and creation & development functions in the UK, Switzerland and Asia, culminating in Senior Vice President, Global Body and Home Care. He will continue to serve in this capacity until the end of June 2019, to ensure a smooth transition with his successor, to be announced in due course.

A firm believer in the great potential of China, Firmenich has been investing consistently over the last 30 years to expand its footprint and capabilities in this strategic market. Most recently Firmenich launched its largest flavor manufacturing plant in the world in Zhangjiagang, scaling-up its capacity to meet its customers’ demand for innovative and fast-to-market solutions. This plant complements its operations in Shanghai and Kunming serving its Perfumery and Ingredients Businesses. In 2012, Firmenich opened a major Research Center in Shanghai, dedicated to driving cutting edge technologies to best serve its customers in China. Firmenich has a nationwide presence of commercial facilities with application laboratories in Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou.

 

About Firmenich

Firmenich is the world’s largest privately-owned perfume and taste company, founded in Geneva, Switzerland, in 1895. Driven by its purpose to create positive emotions to enhance wellbeing, naturally, Firmenich has designed many of the world’s best-known perfumes and tastes, bringing delight to over four billion consumers every day. Renowned for its world-class research and creativity, as well as its leadership in sustainability, each year, Firmenich invests 10% of its turnover in R&D to understand and share the best that nature has to offer responsibly. Firmenich had an annual turnover of 3.7 billion Swiss Francs at end June 2018.