Perfumer & Flavorist

SIMPPAR transformed the heart of Grasse into an open-air celebration of perfumery ingredients, welcoming fragrance professionals from around the world to explore new naturals, captives and technological advances against the backdrop of the industry’s historic capital.

Editor's Notebook: The Flavor & Fragrance Ingredients Seen at SIMPPAR and FlavourTalk 2026

From unique citrus to woody notes and beyond, recent events featured ingredients for every occasion.

Elevating the Taste Experience with BioSymphony™

Elevating the Taste Experience with BioSymphony™

Designed to meet growing consumer demand for natural, clean-label ingredients, BioSymphony™ is an innovative portfolio of natural flavors crafted directly from nature’s finest ingredients.

Overall, this year’s Esxence signaled a category at a crossroads: expanding rapidly in scale and creativity, but increasingly challenged by oversaturation and the need to sustain meaning in an overcrowded fragrance landscape.

Esxence 2026: “Sensing the World” Signals a New Era of Scale, Storytelling, and Scent Saturation in Artistic Perfumery

Brands leaned heavily into immersive activation strategies to drive engagement.

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Elevating the Taste Experience with BioSymphony™

Elevating the Taste Experience with BioSymphony™

The work identified molecular weight, size, shape and polarity as the dominant drivers separating weak from powerful odorants—findings that align with long-established mass-transport principles governing volatility, sorption and receptor access.

AI Takes on Odor Strength: New Study Maps the Molecular Drivers of Fragrance Impact

By combining capabilities in skin science, microbiome research and functional health ingredients, the division is designed to help customers create “inside-out” and holistic care solutions.

Inside-Out Care: Symrise Launches Division Linking Beauty, Wellness and Biotics

The new Brazilian household care application lab will focus on laundry and dishwashing systems, allowing formulators to evaluate enzyme performance under regional washing conditions and water profiles. The facility is intended to speed formulation development and strengthen collaboration with detergent manufacturers working on next-generation cleaning products.

IFF Expands Fermentation and Enzyme Innovation Footprint in Latin America

The deal establishes FlavorSum's new West Coast Innovation Center in Brea, California, expands its North American manufacturing footprint and adds powdered flavor capabilities to complement its existing strengths in beverages, bakery, dairy, sports nutrition, gummies and better-for-you applications.

FlavorSum Expands Again, Acquires S&S Flavors to Add West Coast Innovation Hub and Powdered Flavor Expertise

FlavorSum continues to broaden its technical expertise, geographic reach and application capabilities.

For decades, the flavor and fragrance industry has operated within a relatively stable classification system. Ingredients were broadly categorized as natural extracts, fermentation-derived materials or synthetically produced molecules. These distinctions were largely sufficient when production routes were clearly separated and molecular identity aligned closely with manufacturing method. However, these boundaries are becoming increasingly difficult to define.

When the Molecule Is the Same, but the Label Isn't: How 'Natural' Keeps Its Edge

How maturing biocatalytic production routes are reshaping long-standing distinctions between “synthetic” and “natural” aroma ingredients in the flavor and fragrance industry.

Unlike traditional sleep technologies that focus primarily on tracking metrics or rely on external interventions, Kimba claims it uses a closed-loop system that continuously learns from individual sleep patterns. The platform reads sleep behaviors, selects targeted scent formulations, delivers scent at optimized moments throughout the night, measures responses and recalibrates future experiences.

Kimba Raises $5.4M to Bring AI-Powered Scent Science to the Future of Sleep

Startup combines olfactory neuroscience, artificial intelligence and personalized scent delivery to create a new category of non-pharmacological sleep technology.

Elevating the Taste Experience with BioSymphony™

Elevating the Taste Experience with BioSymphony™

Designed to meet growing consumer demand for natural, clean-label ingredients, BioSymphony™ is an innovative portfolio of natural flavors crafted directly from nature’s finest ingredients.

A €5,000 Best Ph.D. Thesis Award will also recognize an outstanding final-year doctoral researcher. The winner will present their work at the annual Savory Flavor & Food Industry Conference in Geneva, Switzerland, connecting with potential employers and industry leaders.

Flavor’s Next Generation: Giract Opens 17th Annual European Ph.D. Flavor Research Awards

The 2026/2027 edition will award six €3,000 bursaries to first-year Ph.D. students conducting research in flavor science, technology, chemistry and related fields.

'Looking ahead, Takasago’s 'Technology for the Future' will drive innovation and strengthen our position in the flavor industry,' says Satoshi Masumura, chairman and CEO of Takasago.

Beyond Taste Q&A: How Takasago Is Redefining Flavor Innovation Through Technology and Sustainability

From AI to upcycled ingredients: Takasago's approach to reinventing how the world tastes.

Coty noted that it grew Gucci Beauty revenue by more than 60% since 2019, driven by franchises including Gucci Flora, Bloom, Guilty and The Alchemist's Garden, positioning the transaction as a monetization of value it helped create.

Gucci Beauty Changes Hands Early: Coty Cashes Out as L’Oréal Secures a 50-Year Luxury Prize

Coty is trading future Gucci revenues for immediate cash to strengthen its balance sheet and concentrate resources on owned and priority prestige brands.

IFF is debuting the technology in fabric care with Floral Fusion, the first Sensora fragrance designed specifically for liquid laundry detergents. Part of the company's fragrance experience enhancer portfolio, Floral Fusion releases refined floral notes on dry fabrics after washing, enriching the fragrance beyond its original scent signature.

IFF's Light-Activated Sensora Signals Next Frontier in Long-Lasting Fragrance Performance

"With Sensora, we are advancing fragrance performance into a new territory—one where scent continues to reveal itself in real life, long after the first moment of use."

While encapsulation has long been associated with fabric care and controlled scent release, the partnership signals a growing shift toward applying the technology to prestige fragrance formats, where performance, sensory experience and formulation flexibility are becoming increasingly important differentiators.

Givaudan Accelerates Focus on Alcohol-Free Fine Fragrance with Strategic Microcaps Partnership

The collaboration will initially focus on non-alcoholic fine fragrance performance.

The New Rules of Fragrance Growth: Jean Madar on Scent's Next Phase

"While we still expect healthy growth, we are in what could be considered a maturing growth phase which is different from the unprecedented expansion of a few years ago."

A May 2026 forecast from De Monchy predicts a further 12.9% reduction in the Brazilian orange crop, marking the sixth consecutive small harvest heavily impacted by greening.

Navigating Feedstock Shocks, Climate Disruption and Regulatory Fragmentation in Global Aroma Chemicals

Naphtha shortages, citrus disease, and geopolitical turmoil collide to reshape aroma chemical sourcing.

CEO Mike Size is expanding the company’s supplier alliance strategy to accelerate innovation, shorten lead times and bring next-generation ingredients to market faster.

From Supplier to Strategic Partner: Inside Penta’s Growth Playbook with Greg Robertson and Mike Size

How one ingredient supplier is transforming itself into a strategic powerhouse through supply chain innovation and customer integration.