The office is intended to strengthen Frutarom's standing and activity in East Asia, and marks the next step in Frutarom's strategy to become one of the world's top ten flavour players.
"Frutarom continually seeks to expand its core activities both through the development of unique products with high added value for its customers and by expanding its business to additional countries and markets in emerging countries, where the growth rates are substantially higher than the average for Europe and the UnitedStates," said president Ori Yehudai.
The opening of the office also underlines the firm's rapid growth strategy, combining internal growth in core activities with strategic acquisitions in strategic geographic locations.
"Indonesia is one of the largest emerging markets in the world, with over two hundred million residents. We believe that this office, which joins five other Frutarom sales and marketing offices in the Far East, will make a serious contribution to our continued growth in this developing region."
The move is the latest in a line of recent acquisitions by the ambitious flavour company. The company bought the flavouring extracts business of AM Todd Botanical Therapeutics in June, and in August last year Frutarom completed the €30 million acquisition of International Flavours & Fragrance's (IFF's) fruit preparation operations in Europe, including Germany, Switzerland and France.
Buying into IFF's fruit and vegetable extract business gives Frutarom a firm foothold in the growing natural ingredients market: a market currently enjoying success as it profits from the booming consumer trend for health and wellness products and to due to break the billion euro barrier by 2009.
In a previous acquisition, Frutarom UK paid €20 million in June 2003 for the Swiss flavours company Emil Flachsmann (now Frutarom Switzerland), providing it with an increased stake in the botanical extracts market, and the company has also been looking at emerging markets.
"Last year, we established two subsidiaries and developmentlaboratories in Romania and Belarus that will contribute significantly to strengthening our activity and our positioning in Eastern Europe," said Yehudai.
Frutarom continued to grow during the first quarter of 2005 for the 22nd consecutive quarter. Sales grew 47.3 per cent compared with the same quarter in 2004, reaching US$64.7 million. Net profit totaled US$ 7.1 million, growing 66.2 per cent compared the same quarter last year.
Frutarom is a global company operating in the global flavor and ingredient markets. The group has production and development centers on three continents and markets its products on five continents to over 3,500 customers in more than 100 countries.