News

Symrise announces “successful” start to 2017

16 May 2017

Symrise has announced what it says is a “successful” start to 2017, significantly increasing sales and earnings in the first three months. Contributing to this development was strong demand in all segments.

Symrise has announced what it says is a “successful” start to 2017, significantly increasing sales and earnings in the first three months. Contributing to this development was strong demand in all segments. In the first quarter, Symrise increased its sales by 4.6% to €765.2 million (Q1 2016: €731.8 million). Adjusted for portfolio and exchange rate effects, the Group achieved organic growth of 5.3%. Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) were up by 4.4% to €165.5 million (Q1 2016 EBITDAN: €158.5 million).

"The targeted investments to expand our portfolio, the further development of our customer relationships, and the efforts to build our market presence continued to pay off in the first quarter,” said Dr. Heinz-Jürgen Bertram, CEO of Symrise. “We seamlessly maintained our strong performance into the first months of 2017, expanded our existing business in all segments, and also gained new customer projects. There is therefore every reason to feel confident as we look forward to the coming months. We plan to continue pushing ahead with our growth initiatives and to keep expanding our market position. For 2017 we are planning a number of projects. These will include gaining broad access to natural, sustainable raw materials and the expansion of our capacities in Holzminden as well as internationally."

The Flavor segment, which includes aroma applications, generated sales of €270.2 million (Q1 2016: €250.2 million). This represents an increase of 8.0% as compared to the prior-year quarter. Organic growth stood at 8.8%. All application areas achieved significant sales increases in the first quarter.

Among the regions, the main growth driver was EAME, which achieved a double-digit sales increase. Important contributions to growth came especially from the Sweet and Savory Business Units in the national markets of Germany and France as well as North Africa. Beverages also showed solid growth, especially in Germany as well as the Near and Middle East.

In the Asia/Pacific region, sales in applications for sweets were up substantially in the national markets of Japan, India and the Philippines, but increased only moderately in Indonesia.

The region Latin America performed generally well, benefiting especially from double-digit growth rates in Beverages in Argentina. In Brazil, demand in that area was generally more restrained in the first three months of the year.

In the region North America, Symrise continued with the successful expansion of its existing business. In addition, demand grew due to product launches.

The Nutrition segment, which includes the Diana division, with applications for foods, pet food and baby food as well as probiotics, achieved strong growth and a 17.8% increase in sales to €161.8 million (Q1 2016: €137.3 million). Excluding portfolio effects, the segment experienced an organic sales increase of 9.6%.

Sales in applications for food ingredients showed a very satisfactory development due to strong demand in North and Latin America. Strong organic growth was achieved in both of those regions. In addition, important projects with global and regional customers were successfully implemented.

In Probiotics, Symrise increased sales through the acquisition of the US company Nutraceutix. The application area achieved double-digit growth even after the acquisition effects, especially in the regions North America and EAME.

Symrise confirmed its growth and profitability targets for the current fiscal year. The Group said it remains confident that it will continue to achieve growth on a sustainable basis in 2017, and aims to substantially outperform the relevant market – which is projected to grow at a rate of about 3%.