January 27, 2015

American Cleaning Institute Annual Meeting

Henkel awards outstanding suppliers

At the 2015 American Cleaning Institute (ACI) Annual Meeting and Industry Convention, January 26 through January 30 in Orlando, Florida, Henkel nominated eleven and awarded four suppliers for their best-in-class performance in 2014. Winner of the evening was BASF, who received both “Best Innovation Contributor” and “Sustainability Award” for Laundry & Home Care and was nominated for “Best Supply Performance”, for which Stepan was awarded. The “Best Innovation Contributor” in Beauty Care was Wacker. The “Sustainability Award” for Beauty Care went to Solvay.

Henkel CFO Carsten Knobel highlighted the importance of the suppliers’ role in the execution of the company’s strategy as he opened the 8th Henkel Award Ceremony. “Our suppliers are at the core of value creation because they deliver the right quality and quantity on time, support our operational excellence, embrace innovation and sustainability and manage supply risks and ensure competitiveness. Therefore, a close strategic partnership with our core suppliers is key”, he said to the 150 high-level attendees from all major suppliers. 

Bertrand Conquéret, Corporate Senior Vice President Purchasing, gave more details on Henkel’s strategy regarding one global supply chain before passing over to the awards.

BASF recognized as “Best Innovation Contributor Laundry & Home Care 2014” 
Strong business partners play a decisive role in developing innovative products. “The new and patented fabric softener compound has shown great advantages by combining oils with aqueous formulations, which results in consumer products with unique transparent aesthetics,” says Prof. Dr. Thomas Müller-Kirschbaum, Corporate Senior Vice President R&D Laundry & Home Care. “The new softener variants have already been very successfully introduced into various markets worldwide.” Further nominees for this award were Evonik and Stepan.

BASF received “Sustainability Award Laundry & Home Care 2014” 
Through strong collaboration in development and application, BASF has made a substantial contribution to laundry detergents’ sustainability. “In the development of a new generation of premium laundry detergents, BASF has provided unique high-performance ingredients that achieve great advance in two very important sustainability dimensions, performance and energy saving,” says Dr. Michael Dreja, Director International Research Laundry & Home Care. “Tough and stubborn stains can now be removed at much lower washing temperature than with conventional detergents, which enables consumers to save time and energy.” Further nominees for this award were AB Enzymes and Novozymes. 

Wacker awarded as “Best Innovation Contributor Beauty Care 2014” 
Dr. Thomas Förster, Corporate Vice President R&D Beauty Care, handed the award for 'Best Innovation Contributor Beauty Care' to Wacker, which developed a new reactive silicone material that significantly improves the surface properties of human hair. “The new reactive silicone delivers excellent hydrophobization of the hair surface and considerably improves the combing properties of damaged hair,” says Förster. “The reactivity of this unique material is due to condensation reactions on the hair surface and leads to outstanding long-term effects.” Further nominees for this award were Croda and Dow Corning. 

Solvay honored with “Sustainability Award Beauty Care 2014“ 
“We are pleased to present the 'Sustainability Award Beauty Care’ to our business partner Solvay. Solvay offers us a unique key component for the 2-in-1 Neutralizing Treatment Wash of our new ethnic brand Smooth’n Shine”, says Förster, “This innovative 2-in-1 product saves the usual conditioning step with additional rinsing after relaxing of ethnic hair and will therefore save more than 15,000 cubic meters of water and 200 tons of CO2 in 2015.” Further nominees for this award were Lonza and Symrise. 

Stepan awarded for “Best Supply Performance 2014” 
Reliable and flexible partners are crucial for Henkel to ensure product quality. “Stepan has been recognized for their best supply performance regarding quality, quantity and timeliness of supply, end-to-end process support, cash networking capital enhancement and value creation in Supply Chain. Stepan fully supports Henkel’s tools and processes to achieve optimal results for both companies,” states Bertrand Conquéret, Corporate Senior Vice President Purchasing. Further nominees for this award were BASF and Symrise.

Henkel operates worldwide with leading brands and technologies in three business areas: 
Laundry & Home Care, Beauty Care and Adhesive Technologies. Founded in 1876, Henkel holds globally leading market positions both in the consumer and industrial businesses with well-known brands such as Persil, Schwarzkopf and Loctite. Henkel employs about 47,000 people and reported sales of 16.4 billion euros and adjusted operating profit of 2.5 billion euros in fiscal 2013. Henkel’s preferred shares are listed in the German stock index DAX.

Photo material is available at http://www.henkel.com/press

Contact	Julie Cruz 	Hanna Philipps
Phone	+49-(0)211-797-8551	+49-(0)211-797-3626
Fax	+49-(0)211-798-4040	+49-(0)211-798-4040
Email	julie.cruz@henkel.com	hanna.philipps@henkel.com

Henkel AG & Co. KGaA