the business of beautyan issue of women’s wear daily

InsIde L’OréaL’s GLObaL InnOvatIOn MachIne wIth Laurent attaL

Dr.Beauty

the SCIenCe

ISSue

Gail Federici: a creative Genius

returns to beauty

the youtube ecosystem explained

skin care: imaGininG the Future

19wwd beauty inc

ITHE

scienceISSUE

DOCTOR OF THE UNIVERSE

18 wwd beauty inc

SIncE bEcomIng L’oréaL’S HEad of rESEarcH and InnovaTIon In 2010, LaUrEnT aTTaL HaS rEdEfInEd How THE bEaUTy gIanT STayS on THE cUTTIng EdgE of ScIEncE.

By Pete Born PhotograPhed By nathan Pask

t is, perhaps, a rare man who can

admit to getting passionate about

damaged hair. But Laurent Attal is

not your average guy.

He wears the mantle of a more

than century-old tradition of trail-

blazing scientific inquiry at L’Oréal,

dating back to when a chemist, Eu-

gene Schueller, invented a safe hair

dye in 1907 and founded what is

now the largest beauty company in the world.

In 1936, Schueller followed the hair coloring

breakthrough with the invention of sunscreen.

Attal, L’Oréal’s executive vice president of

research and innovation, follows in those deep

footsteps. He leads a global army of 3,800 sci-

entists and other technical experts in driving

what chairman and chief executive officer Jean-

Paul Agon calls “the generator of the innovation

machine” at “the heart of the company.”

L’Oréal spends 3.5 percent of its net sales—

approaching $1 billion based on 2012 results

converted with an average exchange rate—on

science and research and development, a dra-

matic increase from the 2.8 percent of sales in

2002. The company maintains that it spends

the most on R&D—in terms of percentage of

sales. In absolute terms of euros and dollars,

“L’Oréal is one of the industry’s highest spend-

ers as it views science as key to its innovation

process,” according to a UBS research note.

Underscoring the power of innovation, UBS

notes that 15 to 18 percent of L’Oréal’s sales are

generated by products launched within the last

12 months.

Clearly, the “hope in a jar” school of market-

ing hype of decades past is dead; the future will

be fought in the lab.

As Agon says, Attal brought an unusual pro-

file to the job when he was appointed in 2010.

The research chief has the disciplined curiosity

of a trained dermatologist, which he was, and

the heart and drive of a P&L-honed market-

ing man. His double-barreled persona is fu-

eled by an unmistakable passion for turning

science into innovative products. Attal says he

dreams of one day creating products that can

be customized or personalized for consumers.

21wwd beauty inc 20 wwd beauty inc

Another deep-seated desire is to come up with treatments that rival the results now

reached by aesthetic procedures using needles, like Botox injections. He also thinks

about a universe of products aimed at 75-year-old women.

During a rare interview in his office at L’Oréal headquarters in the Paris suburb

of Clichy and while guiding a visitor through the seldom-seen inner sanctums of

Advanced and Applied Research, Attal touches on a wide-ranging number of is-

sues, often animating them with flashes of emotion. At one point during a lengthy

discussion, he zeroes in on one of his numerous points.

“I like this damaged-hair story because, first of all, this is the number-one con-

cern,” he says, the cadence of his voice quickening. “This is really the number-one

hair problem everywhere, everywhere, everywhere; it’s at a parity with hair loss. In

terms of opportunity, it’s the number-one opportunity.”

In January of 2010, Attal returned from New York, where he was the ceo of

L’Oréal’s U.S. subsidiary, with a mandate from Agon to reorganize the R&D opera-

tion. The aim was to link the innovation department to the research operation in

order to give scientists some guidance in where they should be headed.

Today, the R&D organization is headed by Advanced Research, which is respon-

sible for researching basic science—how skin problems occur—and developing key

active ingredients, whether on their own or in collaborations with other scientific

organizations or suppliers. Once this is done, the molecules are handed to Applied

Research, which creates the formulas incorporating the active ingredients. Some-

times the Applied staff creates formulations without new actives. Then the formu-

las are handed to the development department for the creation of products. The

research pipeline can stretch out five or 10 years, Attal says, proudly noting that

L’Oréal has accumulated 611 patents, making it the fourth-largest patent holder in

France. The auto industry is first.

The innovation department, headed by Jacques Challes, chief innovation offi-

cer, consults frequently with Advanced and Applied Research, often at the begin-

ning of the process. “We believe that innovation can come from everywhere—ev-

erywhere—and that is very important,” says Attal, touching on a favorite refrain.

“We foster the constant interaction between marketing and research because we

believe that the big ideas will come from these interactions. This interaction is the

interaction between consumers and science. This [science] push and [consumer]

pull model defines the big innovations of tomorrow because it’s based on consumer

need, but also it will change consumer attitudes.”

He continues, “We felt that it was quite relevant to strengthen our marketing vi-

sion, our marketing tools, prospective tools to nourish Advanced and Applied Re-

search because our objective is to always transform science into innovative product.”

The coupling of innovation with R&D goes to the heart of Agon’s strategic vision

for L’Oréal. “What’s important is to identify from the very beginning what are the ar-

eas in which the scientists should work because if you don’t, [they] are very eager to

explore all kinds of areas and the universe,” says Agon. “It’s very important to chan-

nel them in the beginning and say, ‘Okay, this is where we want you to research.’”

Secondly, he continues, “It is very important to have business people and market-

ing people from the very early stage close to the scientist to make sure that the first

discovery that they make is going to be able to be transformed into innovations.

Very often, the great idea is the combination of a great scientific mind and a great

marketing mind.”

Thus far, the strategy is working. “The past two or three years have been the best

in the history of the company in terms of innovation products,” Agon says, tick-

ing off Lancôme Visionnaire, Skin Perfection by L’Oréal Paris and Vichy Neogenic

hair-loss treatment as examples.

Market analysts agree. Eva Quiroga, an analyst at UBS, believes there’s been

an uptick in innovation at L’Oréal over the past three-and-a-half years. “What’s

good about the setup is that there is a direct link between research and commer-

cial, which creates a good balance between consumer pull and push [of science],”

she said recently after taking a three-day tour of the labs. She notes that L’Oréal

spends the most in percentage of sales, “and even in euro terms, they are pretty

high up,” adding that the company’s strategy of increasing R&D spend moving

forward is positive.

“It’s always a good idea to spend a bit more, as R&D is in their genes, and market-

ing can only go so far if the product is not right,” says Quiroga.

Karen Grant, vice president and global industry analyst at NPD Group, also

notes a pickup in innovation in the last three years, citing the positioning of oil in

L’Oréal Paris’ Age Perfect franchise, the development of Garnier and the Lancôme

launches, Visionnaire and DreamTone Ultimate Dark Spot Corrector.

Victoria Gustafson, principal and team lead of strategic insights at IRI, says

L’Oréal has “made significant strides,” in hair color and hair care.

Agon says that L’Oréal will again increase its support of R&D this year, and

gives high marks to Attal. “Laurent has completely transformed, modernized and

globalized in three years the R&D department that in a way even went beyond

my wildest dreams.”

L’Oréal now has six R&D hubs, with France serving as the home of the World-

wide Center for Advanced Research. The five other hubs are in the U.S., Brazil,

India, China and Japan. There are also 17 evaluation centers and 50 scientific de-

partments all over the world.

Attal explains the theory behind globalizing technology. It’s not about emerging

or developed markets. “The idea is to innovate locally, but for innovation that has a

global reach,” he says.

Explaining further L’Oréal’s doctrine of universalization, Attal says, “It’s not just

about respecting the differences of the Chinese, but to be inspired by the Chinese

beauty routines, by the Chinese hair…to invent new technology for the rest of the

world. This is much more ambitious than just adaptation.”

He says that L’Oréal has labs in China and India at least partly because both

countries have long traditions of medical knowl-

edge, which gives L’Oréal a starting point. “We start

from the traditions and [then] from the observa-

tions, we go backward to the molecule,” he says.

“This is very complementary.”

The globalized technologies are also adapted to

satisfy regional needs. To illustrate the point, At-

tal turns to one of his favorite subjects—damaged

hair—and its number-one market, Brazil. He lists

the five key characteristics of damaged hair—split

ends, roughness of feel, dry hair, fragile, brittle

hair and dullness—which served as the inspiration

for L’Oréal’s worldwide product, Total Repair 5. It

launched in Brazil in 2009, utilizing the main in-

gredient Ceramide R, which was developed in 1994.

“It was a huge success four years ago in Brazil,” Attal

says. “So in 2011-2012, we rolled out the Total Repair 5 line and adapted the for-

mula to all the local consumer needs and made it global. We are [currently] intro-

ducing it in the U.S. in the new line, Advanced Care with Total Repair 5 Extreme.”

He notes conditioners are popular with American women, but the resultant feel

of the hair is also important to them. Hence a new formula was designed for the U.S.

Back in Brazil, the L’Oréal team decided they wanted to incorporate the U.S. ver-

sion, but it was too expensive. So they found a way to reduce the cost. Meanwhile,

in China, which is largely a shampoo market and where hair damage is also a key

concern, the Shanghai team took the Western technology and developed “a com-

pletely new technology for shampoo for damaged hair.”

“This technology was taken up now by other countries,” Attal concludes. “We are

in an ongoing process to make it global with local adaptations.”

Attal recalls making a home visit to a 27-year-old middle-class Brazilian woman—

“but low-middle class”—last February. She had a beauty routine of seven products—

all for hair. “She knows perfectly how a product works and she can immediately—just

by the touch and the way it works—say, ‘This product is better than this one.’”

L’Oréal has always been an exponent of the primary role science plays in beauty

marketing, and Agon sees it as the way the company will win in the future. He says

he always tells investors that L’Oréal has the conviction: “Beauty is about technol-

ogy, it’s about quality and if you are always at the top of quality and innovation, it

goes through the best R&D and science. This is more than ever true.”

Damaged hair may present a huge opportunity, but Attal has his eye on the

horizon. Asked to name a dream product he would like to create, the R&D chief

responds by naming future frontiers. One revolves around the customization and

personalization of products.

He references studies L’Oréal has completed that show old skin repairs itself

more slowly than young skin, indicating that product formulas

have to be adjusted. More puzzling—and a more opportune

challenge—is why a product will work for some people and not

others, even though their situations are similar. Attal says that

it has also been proven that “some cosmetics ingredients in the

same type of skin have different responses,” he says. “To get an

additional level of performance, the individualization, the per-

sonalization, the customization of our product ingredients will

take us to new heights and that’s a new level of performance.”

Asked how far off these customizable products of the future

are, he replies, “We’re working on the path.”

Another dream product would “get closer to the perfor-

mance of aesthetic procedures but remain in the cosmetics

field and preserve a natural look,” he says in an apparent refer-

ence to procedures like Botox injections. “We have a research

program on that challenge,” he says, adding that the work is

being done “in full respect of cosmetics regulations.”

In the hair-care area, Attal’s goals turn more sweeping—“get rid of hair loss, get rid

of hair graying. Find out the universal and long-lasting solution for hair damage all

over the world. We have a lot to do on that. I have many, many dreams about that.”

Some of Attal’s “dreams” are well on their way to becoming reality. In a later in-

terview at the Worldwide Advanced Research Center, which occupies a campus

in the suburb of Aulnay, Isabel Marey-Semper, senior vice president of the divi-

sion, explains that scientific teams are at work on how to personalize products for

individuals with similar characteristics or groups (“clusterization”). “In terms of

cosmetics, we are more and more evolving towards a personalized solution,” she

says. “We are working on understanding the differences not only between ages and

ethnicities, but also between people.”

Attal is also extremely focused on the population growth of people over 75, noting

that demographic figures project that by 2030, 385 million women and men will be

over 75. That’s larger than the U.S. population, he points out, adding that 90 mil-

lion will come from China, 80 million from Europe, 30 million from North America

and 22 million from Japan. L’Oréal studied the product consumption of seniors and

discovered that they use less hair color and color cosmetics, but “foundation is still

high and skin care remains very substantial.” Attal says. “That is a clear signal we

absolutely need to adapt our formula to seniors. This is very important to consider.

It’s not going to be taken for granted. We need to work very, very hard on that.”

“A lot of people say China will become old before it becomes rich—per capita,”

agrees Challes of the innovation department. “If we want to do our job for the

next 10 years, we better look at the aging of the Chinese population, and the aging

of the Chinese population is not the same as the aging of the European and the

American population.”

1978 1993 1994 1995 1995 1996 2005 2006 2007 2008 2010 2011 2012 2012

First launched in L’Oréal Professionnel’s Majirel and CreScendo

hair colorants.

First launched in sun-care products from Vichy

and La Roche Posay.

First launched in Biotherm products. First launched in sun-

care products from Vichy and La Roche Posay.

First launched in L’Oréal Paris Elsève

shampoo.

First launched in hair care from Vichy-Dercos.

First launched in hair care from Vichy-Dercos. First launched in

Lancôme’s Absolue BX skin-care range.

First launched in L’Oréal Paris’ Glam

Shine lip gloss.

First launched in Majirouge and LuoColor

hair dyes from L’Oréal Professionnel.

First launched in Kérastase’s Volumorphose

and Fiberceutic from L’Oréal Professionnel.

First launched in Visionnaire Advanced Skin

Corrector from Lancôme.

First launched in Lancôme’s

Absolue l’Extrait skin-care range.

First launched in Vichy Dercos’ Neogénic.

IONENE G MEXORYL SX ThERMaL PLaNkTON MEXORYL XL CERaMIDE R aMINEXIL SP94 PRO-XYLaNE PSEUDOBLOCS RUBILaNE INTRa-CYLaNE LR2412 DEDIFFERENTIaTED ROSE CELLS

STEMOXYDINE

Hair fiber protective polymer

Hydrophilic UVA filter

Ferment obtained by biotechnology from

a bacteria.

Lipophilic UVA and UVB filter

Hair fiber repairAnti hair loss Combats thin hair

Green chemistry antiaging ingredient derived from xylose

Branching polymer Red dye Hair fiber filler Antiaging ingredient targeting all levels

of the skin Obtained by plant

biotechnology

Hair density-promoting active ingredient

Vitreoscilla Filiformis

“”

A History of innovAtiongroundbreaking research is a key component of L’oréal’s mission. Here, a look at some of the most innovative molecules and technologies from the company’s labs over the last 50 years.

22 wwd beauty inc

In addition to the beauty habits pointed out by Attal, Challes says these

“superseniors” tend to favor foundations, powders and blush “because it gives you

a sort of lively look,” he says. They stop using mascara because it’s too tricky to ap-

ply. “Hair color—a lot give it up because it’s a chore. We could make easier-to-use

hair color or lighter shades so that it’s not such a big contrast between your features

and your hair,” he says. Moreover, perceptions may change by 2030. Just as to-

day’s 55-year-olds think and behave as if they are still 30, Challes says the bet that

marketers have is that the “75 of tomorrow won’t be the 75 of today.” His recipe

for tomorrow: “Whiten, brighten eyes, intensify lashes, eyebrows, mistake-proof

makeup, contrast of femininity, re-densify skin surface and so on.”

Challes, whose previous assignment was to run L’Oréal’s India subsidiary, heads

a team of 25 innovation experts. “Our job is to be ahead of the game and also help

the labs understand the consumer needs ahead.” He says someone on one of the re-

search teams “told me that we are the headlights in the night for some researchers.

Sometimes the researchers do not always know if there will be an outcome or any

market for whatever they are inventing. We can help them because we know them,

we talk in confidence. We are not going to put that on the market tomorrow morn-

ing, so they have the trust and the room in their head to think and discuss with us.”

He demonstrates one of the tools he uses, a chart for every global market show-

ing the top 10 beauty opportunities of local consumers. It measures the level of

inconvenience felt by consumers as they deal with beauty problems. “If a problem

is very big,” he says, “you have a big potential if you can bring a solution.”

In China, for instance, Challes says the number-one problem is thinness of hair

and hair loss and in Brazil it’s damaged hair.

Pointing to another chart, he says, “This is skin care in China, which

everybody agrees in 10 years will be the largest single market in the

world. Skin care in China might be bigger than the full beauty market

of France or Germany.”

Challes says his team delves into studies, takes pictures of women in

the field, visits them at home and then goes back to the lab and says to

scientists, “What can we do for each of these?”

Challes is not alone in trying to stay a step ahead. Attal is already

there. When asked what is the most important mark that he wants to

imprint and leave on the organization, Attal replies that he would like

to leave a worldwide, multipillar organization with a highly creative in-

ternational team of scientists who will contribute to the task of attract-

ing one billion new L’Oréal consumers, as Agon has decreed. “That

means major breakthroughs,” he says, “major innovations in skin care

and hair care. Innovation will be the key driver in this new adventure.”

While the acquisition of one billion new customers is the overall goal,

the day-to-day work is more focused. “The real target is how to conquer

the new middle class emerging everywhere, which is going to be a huge

opportunity,” Attal says. “Wealthy people of tomorrow won’t be the wealthy people

of today. The new Chinese are very wealthy people. In one generation, they don’t

have the same kind of beauty aspiration. For example, the personalization could be

much more important to them. All that is going to change, but the emerging middle

class is a huge opportunity. When you look at L’Oréal just after the Second World

War and the way they captured the middle class in Europe, it’s actually the same

job that we have to do.”

Attal believes that conquest will depend upon scientific breakthroughs; the heart

of that work beats at Advanced Research. The spark plugs of L’Oréal’s vast R&D

engine are found in the search for proprietary active ingredients. Scientists at Ad-

vanced Research can spend five to 10 years developing such molecules because they

can result in products for a succession of brands covering a lifespan that bridges

decades. The development of these supermolecules, as expensive and time consum-

ing as it is, offers L’Oréal the opportunity to cascade the active ingredients down

through different brands, adopting different chemical signatures along the way.

Usually, these ingredients are first used in the higher-priced premium and specialty

brands and then work down. Attal ticks off a series of market-altering molecules,

starting with Pro-Xylane that first appeared in Lancôme Absolu in 2006, then was

worked into formulas for Vichy, SkinCeuticals and La Roche-Posay before ending

up last year in Revitalift Laser X3 by L’Oréal Paris. It is an antiage weapon with

“extraordinary efficacy” in treating wrinkles, promoting firmness and plumping up

the skin, Attal says. Another major advance for the L’Oréal labs is LR 2412, which

powers the formula of Lancôme’s 2011 antiage cream, Visionnaire. Attal asserts

that it was “a great step forward and creates a new category in antiaging, which

was the improvement of skin quality—even skin tone—reducing the pore size and

smoothing the skin.”

At the Advanced Research Center in Aulnay, Maria Dalko, described as “the

mother of LR 2412” by Marey-Semper, heads up the chemistry and process-de-

velopment group. She and her team synthesized the molecule, using jasmonic

acid as an inspiration. Jasmonic acid is a substance produced by many plants as

a defense mechanism in reaction to stress. It was one of the occasions in which

the synthesized molecule had to be stabilized by a formula created by the Applied

Research team. The 800-member Advanced Research division is home to a string

of landmark molecules: the Mexoryl sun filter, which screens UVA and UVB rays;

Ceramide R, which strengthens hair and smooths the fiber; Stemoxydine, which

promotes hair density based on L’Oréal’s research into growth cycles.

Marey-Semper discusses how the division goes about its work. First comes basic

research, digging into how skin disorders, like wrinkles and dark spots, happen. “Our

mission is to understand the scientific origins of cosmetic problems and concerns

to better deal with them and to create and develop major and effective captive ac-

tive ingredients,” she says, adding that these proprietary chemicals are a fundamental

asset of the company. “The bottom line is the profit of L’Oréal,” she says. “When we

are able to develop new ingredients with a major

performance on skin, scalp, hair, arm pits etc., we

know that these ingredients can last for decades.”

mong current projects, the teams are working

on the biological impact of long UVA rays and

studying non-covalent bond chemistry—super-

molecules held together by loose attraction—

that might figure in the development of materi-

als requiring flexibility. Attal also hints that big

things can be expected from L’Oréal’s acquisi-

tion of Clarisonic, the hot-selling skin-cleansing

device. “Clarisonic brings a level of performance

which has been unmatched today in cleansing,”

he says. “Tomorrow it will bring unmatched ben-

efits in skin care, too.”

Noting that L’Oréal also works with ingredient suppliers like Dupont, Dow

Chemical and Symrise, Marey-Semper says Advanced Research also collaborates

with world-class research institutes, such as MIT and the Shanghai Institute, to de-

velop cutting-edge technology. But with all the energy expended on basic research

and invention of ingredients, a great deal of attention is paid to evaluating the fruit

of scientific labor. “We can invent many, many ingredients, Marey-Semper says.

“Maria can invent hundreds of thousands of new molecules. The question is not to

invent molecules, it’s to [find] the right one with the right performance.”

A tour through the evaluation labs suggests that the twin objectives are effi-

cacy and safety. Attal, who quotes François Rabelais as saying “science without

conscience is but the ruin of the soul,” proudly points out that L’Oréal began find-

ing alternatives to animal testing 34 years ago. First, the company invented a

way to create reconstructed epidermis for testing purposes in 1979, then it claims

to have been the first to end animal testing on finished products in 1989. Since

then, L’Oréal has continued to find alternative testing methods for ingredients. In

order to guard against systemic toxicity, L’Oréal switched from alternative test-

ing to a system of more rigorous predictive evaluation, complete with opening a

predictive evaluation center in 2011. Even though the European Union imple-

mented a ban against animal testing on March 13, China still requires testing.

Attal acknowledges that China remains “a prescriber” of animal testing. “We are

the ones to promote alternative methods in China,” he says. “We are making quite

significant progress with them.”

Now, the cultivation of skin is a familiar practice at L’Oréal. José Cotovio, di-

rector of the predictive models and methods department, gave a demonstration in

the Aulnay evaluation center on how a bit of human skin, discarded from plastic

surgery, can be grown into sizable lab samples, complete with all of the necessary

cellular components. In another lab, a multiphoton microscope penetrates the lay-

ers of skin and provides a 3-D image of the workings of cells, showing the differ-

ent materials—collagen, elastin and keratins and so on. The machine reveals the

natural dyes in the skin to show the working parts in color, so researchers can track

the effect of molecules. For instance, researchers can monitor Pro-Xylane, which

promotes the production of collagen by fiberblasts. Frederic Leroy, director of the

physics department, points out the study of melanin, as another example, is impor-

tant for the development of sun protection and whitening products. In another lab,

tests measure the level of friction in hair to see how well conditioner is working.

Finally, eco-toxicity tests are run to detect the effects of a substance on the envi-

ronment, such as freshwater microalgae.

As for general testing, L’Oréal makes thorough assessments on two levels—in

vitro and in vivo—meaning laboratory examinations on skin cells and actual

tryouts on human volunteers. Marey-Semper says she aims for a success rate of

50 percent over the course of the two levels of testing.

The Advanced Research teams are not the only ones making breakthroughs. Attal

points out that the Applied Research squad came up with ODS, or Oil Delivery Sys-

tem. First launched in Inoa hair color by L’Oréal Professionnel in 2009, it allowed the

formula designers to avoid using ammonia, therefore eliminating its smell. Oil is used

in the emulsion to enhance the penetration of the hair colorant in the fiber. “So you

get a large range of color,” Attal says, describing the formula “as a real game changer.”

Jean-Marc Ascione, worldwide hair research director, says that the technology

was later used with Matrix and Redken.

In the nearby suburb of Saint-Ouen stands a gleaming new Worldwide Hair Re-

search Center, which contains 25,000 square meters (269,097 square feet) of work

space and cost about $135 million to build. It is Ascione’s domain. Applied Re-

search makes formulas with the active ingredients developed either by Advanced

Research or obtained from outside sources. “What we do is we investigate their full

potential,” says Ascione, adding that ingredients could be very specific, like a hair

dye, or very general like a surfactant or a polymer. “That’s the beauty of Applied Re-

search, to investigate and see what could be the biggest potential of the new active

ingredient coming from Advance Research.” Ascione notes that the goal is to create

“winning formulas. We meet the specific goals of the needs of consumers, the needs

of the market but also the needs of the brands.”

The final pillar in their research is evaluation, often done with highly sophis-

ticated equipment. One machine analyzes a swatch of hair’s ability to move and

swing. “We have known for years that the hair feel—softness and shine—are known

characteristics. But the movement is something that we are trying to decode be-

cause it is very important,” Ascione says. “There is an expectation of a natural flow.

“When it’s stiff, when it’s limp and has no movement, it doesn’t have the same

healthy-looking aspect. It doesn’t convey the right message,” he says, adding

that stiffness is a characteristic of damaged hair. Another type of evaluation is

by hairdressers, who are working in a laboratory salon with volunteers. It’s com-

mon to see women sitting in chairs while the two sides of their head are treated

differently so an expert can analyze the difference. “These experts are able, just

by touching hair or passing their fingers through it, to reliably characterize the

performance of the product.”

As befits a gleaming new research building, the state of the art equipment includes

a roomful of robotic machines that are designed to relieve scientists of mind-numb-

ing repetitive tasks like weighing raw materials. One robot has already performed one

million weighing operations for 130,000 formulas, and the mixing robot can make

as many as 100 formulas a day. The third robot, which does evaluations, “simulates

multiple hair routines, such as repeated washing of colored hair,” Ascione says.

“There is as much research on cosmetics products as in the space shuttle,” Attal

says. “The fact that we are a pure player in the beauty industry is a fantastic advan-

tage because of the complexity. The more you work on beauty topics and you [gain]

expertise on aging, on damaged hair, on hair density—the stronger you will be in

the future. Imagine the scientific data we have built up over 104 years.”

In remarking how diversified the company has become, Attal, who joined L’Oréal

28 years ago, recalls “the beauty world was much more, let’s say, homogeneous

[then]. We were the same everywhere. Now we look at the world of beauty differ-

ently. We have very sophisticated studies to look at in terms of consumer insight, in

terms of clinical research, biological research and so forth. This is really exciting.”

—With contributions from Jennifer Weil

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U.s.aULnay: Basic ResearchCLIChy: Basic ResearchCheVILLy: Cosmetics ProductssaInt-oUen: Hair Research ParIs: (Hôpital Saint-Louis: Clinical Research) Lyon: Predictive MethodstoUrs: Plant BiotechnologiesgIgors-et-LoZeron: Organic Product DevelopmentLassIgny: YSL Cosmetics Products

redMond, Wa: Instrumental Cosmetics (PBL / Clarisonic)

CLark, n.J.:Head of the U.S. regional hub (Advanced Research, Applied Research and Development)

rIo de JaneIro:Head of the Brazil regional hub (Advanced Research, Applied Research and Development)

tokyoHead of the

Japanese regional hub

(Advanced Research, Applied

Research and Development)BangaLore :

Advanced Research

PUdong:Head of the China regional hub (Advanced Research, Applied Research and Development)

ChICago:Ethnic Hair

and Skin Research

MUMBaI: Head of the

India regional hub

(Applied Research and

Development)

l’oréAl’s worlDwiDE rEACHThe beauty giant has research and innovation centers around the world. Here, a global overview.

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