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CEO of Danisco comments on growth strategy in Wall Street Transcript Interview Full article published: 06/25/2002     ALF DUCH-PEDERSEN is CEO and President of the Executive Board


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This interview is a small excerpt from a comprehensive interview published in The Wall Street Transcript, available at (001-212-952-7433) or http://www.twst.com/sectors/consum.html

TWST: Could we begin with a historical sketch and brief introduction to Danisco?

Mr. Pedersen: Danisco is one of the global leaders in functional food ingredients. We are a global company, listed on the stock exchange in Copenhagen. We were inaugurated some 130 years ago within production of sugar. Today we a company focused on functional food ingredients, which include sugar, emulsifiers, aromas and flavors for the food industry and we have a global sales network.

TWST: How would you describe the competitive environment?

Mr. Pedersen: There are a number of players. We take our product to the market place in the one stop supplier concept, meaning we would like to discuss with our customers about their recipes and thereby their needs for individual and various food ingredients and then we would like to supply them with a system of these ingredients. Amongst those who operate in more or less the same way are ICI Quest and Degussa, which is a German company. Those are the two we normally meet. When we talk about flavors and aromas it’s the IFF, Givaudan.

TWST: It sounds like a tailored, customer-orientated approach. Can you tell us little a bit more about what that entails?

Mr. Pedersen: Yes, we first embarked on producing and selling food ingredients in 1930s, and we really market our products today on the basis of the knowledge about how our customers’ products. We have assembled all that knowledge since the 1930s. We know a lot about how industrial produced food is produced anywhere in the world. That knowledge is of course is a basis for us promoting and marketing our products.

TWST: How much of an emphasis are you placing on research and development? What’s the average spend there each year?

Mr. Pedersen: It varies but it’s around 3 to 5%. We have about 400 people employed in our company around the world who do nothing but innovate and research everyday for new product or new applications for our products. We also have a global network of pilot scale plants where we invite our customers to work together with us on their own products and this allows us to assess whether it is possible for us to improve the product or improve the clients’ economy in any one product.

TWST: Could you take us back 12 months and tell us what strategic moves you have implemented at Danisco?

Mr. Pedersen: Yes, over the last 12 months we have sold a couple of companies, but our ingredients business has progressed pretty well. We had a kick-up in the third quarter, which is the year end for many people – our financial year runs from May 1 to the end of April. We saw that many of our customers were de-stocking and there could also be some seasonality, but overall we met what we had informed the market and so to speak the company is running at a yearly growth of 6%-8% in that part of our business and progressing pretty well.

TWST: What’s the consensus market size?

Mr. Pedersen: The market size is around US21 billion globally and growing by 4%-6% year. Our target is to outgrow it, so again we are growing at 6%-8%.

TWST: How well do you feel the analysts and investor community understand Danisco?

Mr. Pedersen: I will always recommend you to talk to them directly, but you can have my perception. I think they are very much in agreement with what we are doing. They had been somewhat cautious about us because we have done this refocusing of the company, as I said, selling off a number of the businesses and thereby there has always been an execution risk. But now that we have finalized this work I think you will hear the analyst and the investor community becoming more and more positive towards what we do. So I think the investors like what we are doing and are just looking for us to fulfill and show a little bit of consistency with the focused business and then they will be happy.

TWST: Any thoughts on the valuation placed on the company?

Mr. Pedersen: You know life has taught me not to comment on that one.

TWST: If all goes to plan, where will you be positioned four or five years down the road?

Mr. Pedersen: I’d like to see the company more well-known in the world and recognized for being capable of serving its customers to produce very nice, tasty, healthy, safe food from an industrial point of view. And also known for being capable of helping our customers to make more money. So I hope that we can position the company, so that we are without any doubt looked upon as the industry leader for functional ingredients.

TWST: When you have a chance to sit down with investors, what are the three of four main points you give for them to consider an investment in Danisco?

Mr. Pedersen: Number one is that we are a strong company with a lot of experience in executing strategies. We have a strong management team and therefore the company is under control and we can do what we set out to do. The second thing is that we are in a very interesting market. We are so to speak at the high technology end of industrial food production, whether it’d be ice cream, bread, beverages and so forth. And we supply some of the key ingredients for these products without which you could not make those products. In other words, we are approaching a market that is growing by itself and a market that will be there for many years. Further, this is not an industry that we have just jumped into; we have actually been here for many years. Then finally we are a listed company with a 100% free flow and we do look after our shareholders.

TWST: Is there anything you would like to conclude with?

Mr. Pedersen: Although we enjoy this position, we only have 6-7% of the market globally and it means that there is a lot of opportunity out there for us to follow up on. And also you will see that our customers are what drive the market to a significant degree. The food producers, for example, would like to have fewer and fewer suppliers of ingredients. They also want to be able to have an intelligent discussion with some of their suppliers. This assures that we can help each other and motivate each other to produce better profits for our shareholders.


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This interview is a small excerpt from a comprehensive interview published in The Wall Street Transcript on 06/25/02. For more information call (212) 952 7400. The Wall Street Transcript does not endorse any of the comments made by interviewees, and does not make stock recommendations.

Copyright 2002, Wall Street Transcript Corp.

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