ingredient founded 1895 headquarters geneva switzerland key people gilbert ghostine ceo yves boisdron chairman patrick firmenich vice chairman products flavors fragrance ingredient revenue chf3 .0 billion 2015 number of employees over 6 000 2014 website www.firmenich.com firmenich sa is a private swiss company in the perfume and flavor business . it is the largest privately owned company in the field and ranks number two worldwide . 1 firmenich has created perfumes for over 100 years and produced a number of well known flavors . firmenich employs 6 200 people in 63 countries . major competitors include givaudan international flavors and fragrances frutarom and symrise . it bought noville in 2006 and in 2007 acquired danisco s flavor division . history edit the company was founded as chuit & naef in 1895 in geneva by chemist philippe chuit and businessman martin naef . fred firmenich joined in 1900 and later became the majority partner . the company was renamed firmenich sa . firmenich s board named gilbert ghostine as ceo to succeed patrick firmenich effective october 1 2014 . 2 yves boisdron was elected as chairman of firmenich s board of directors as of july 1 2013 . 3 originally a fragrance company firmenich branched into the flavor business by creating a raspberry substitute in 1938 followed by creations of citrus and strawberry flavor . other synthetic flavors followed for use in processed foods and preserved foods . 1 in 1939 firmenich director of research and development lavoslav ru i ka was awarded the nobel prize in chemistry . 4 on may 3 2007 firmenich announced that it would be acquiring the flavors division of danisco in a deal worth 450 million . 5 6 the deal was expected to move firmenich ahead of iff as the second largest flavor company in the world . 1 references edit a b c flavor & fragrance industry top 10 . leffingwell.com . retrieved february 16 2015 . firmenich names new ceo gilbert ghostine effective oct. 1 . perfumerflavorist.com . retrieved february 16 2015 . firmenich announces change of chairman . worldpressonline.com . retrieved february 16 2015 . forward thinking reseach for fragrance & flavor expertise . firmenich . retrieved 7 may 2016 . heller lorraine july 3 2007 . danisco completes flavours sale to firmenich . food navigator . william reed business media . retrieved april 12 2015 . all news . foodnavigator usa.com . retrieved february 16 2015 . external links edit companies portal retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title firmenich & oldid 733784733 categories chemical companies of switzerlandflavor companiesfragrance companiesmanufacturing companies based in geneva navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload filespecial pagespermanent linkpage informationwikidata itemcite this page print export create a bookdownload as pdfprintable version languages deutschfran aisitalianonederlands edit links this page was last modified on 10 august 2016 at 03 11 . text is available under the creative commons attribution sharealike license ; additional terms may apply . by using this site you agree to the terms of use and privacy policy . wikipedia is a registered trademark of the wikimedia foundation inc. a non profit organization . privacy policy about wikipedia disclaimers contact wikipedia developers cookie statement mobile view