Fi Europe 2025 live: Syensqo marks entry into pet food market and showcases new F&B solutions

Syensqo brings a range of nature- and science-inspired ingredients to Fi Europe 2025, showcasing solutions that enhance flavor, freshness, and consumer trust in food, beverages, and pet nutrition.

These innovations enable manufacturers to deliver great taste with reliable flavor and preservation solutions, meeting the growing demand for more natural ingredients and tastier products.

Food Ingredients First speaks with Maud Joassard, global marketing manager, and Cem Dik, sales development manager at Syensqo, live from the show. 

“It is part of Syensqo’s DNA to continuously enhance the performance of its ingredient range to support customers facing evolving formulation and market challenges. We have more than a century of industrial experience, which has allowed us to build unique expertise across a wide range of applications and to support our customers in multiple food segments,” says Joassard. 

Innovations for food applications

Syensqo is presenting solutions designed for performance, reliability, and compliance across F&B applications. 

This includes Riza, a range of natural antioxidants available in liquid and powder forms, based on wild rosemary extracts that extend shelf life and preserve freshness, offering food manufacturers an alternative to synthetic preservatives. 

“Riza rosemary extracts offer a comprehensive solution for natural preservation that goes beyond just extending shelf life. One of their key advantages is excellent heat stability, which means they retain their antioxidant effectiveness even under demanding processing conditions, such as baking, frying, or sterilization. This makes Riza suitable for a wide variety of food applications, from oils and snacks to meats and ready meals,” explains Dik. 

Another benefit is the flexibility in dosage, he flags. “Riza extracts can be precisely tailored to meet the specific needs of different products and formulations, ensuring optimal protection without impacting taste, aroma, or appearance. This versatility allows manufacturers to address a broad range of preservation challenges with a single, natural solution.”

Riza is 100% natural and carefully purified, supporting clean label claims and meeting strict regulatory requirements. This means manufacturers can confidently replace synthetic additives without sacrificing performance or transparency — helping them meet both consumer and industry expectations, adds Dik. 

High-purity vanillin 

The company is also showcasing its expertise in vanillin, with Rhovanil, a high-purity vanillin available in several grades that meet diverse needs, ranging from bakery products to beverages. 

Syensqo recently announced it will restart its synthetic vanillin production unit in Saint-Fons, France, by the end of 2025, ensuring greater supply reliability for European customers. It also brings Rhovanil Natural to Fi Europe, a bio-based vanillin derived from fermentation, compliant with both EU and US natural flavor labeling requirements. Additionally, it is also showcasing that its Rhodiarome ingredient, ethyl vanillin, delivers three times more flavor intensity than standard vanillin.

Joassard explains: “Syensqo is restarting its synthetic Rhovanil vanillin production in France, indeed to support customers in Europe, and beyond, for this key product for the food flavor and fragrance industry.”

“Thanks to our unique industrial footprint, with production sites in France, in the US, and in China, Rhovanil vanillin can be closer to its customers, strengthening supply security and ensuring consistent, reliable quality in every region,” she shares. 

“This synthetic production complements our Rhovanil Natural and Syensqo EU Natural vanillin production on the same site (Saint-Fons, France). It strengthens our position to support customers in all their challenges, including meeting the growing expectations of customers for natural and clean label recipes.”

Beyond the primary benefits of vanillin or ethyl vanillin flavor, Joassard emphasizes that the company’s portfolio of aromas can support far more, offering organoleptic stability during shelf life, process stability, and also functional benefits, such as off-note blockers, especially in high-protein nutrition foods or plant-based recipes.

Visitors to Fi Europe are invited to live demos featuring sweet foods, crackers, and hot beverages that showcase how ingredients inspired by nature can enhance flavor.“In beverages (alcoholic or non-alcoholic), our range of flavors and ingredients, either synthetic or natural, can help compensate for the sugar reduction, bring more mouthfeel or roundness, or even boost some notes. We have several demo kits available at our stand,” she comments. 

Pet food solutions 

For the first time, Syensqo is also introducing solutions for pet nutrition at Fi Europe, expanding its ingredient expertise into the fast-growing pet food market.

Driven by the “humanization of pet food,” the company says these innovations help manufacturers create recipes that combine taste and quality similar to those found in human food.

Dik tells us: “The pet nutrition industry is growing, with dogs and cats accounting for around 98% of category share. At the same time, the humanization of pet food is reshaping expectations, as pet food is increasingly held to the same standards as human food, with a growing demand for cleaner labels, appetizing aromas, high-quality ingredients, and transparent sourcing. Pet owners are now called ‘Pet Parents,’ which says it all.”

The company’s innovations in pet nutrition include: Rhovea Feed, a vanillin grade tailored for pet and animal nutrition, which improves palatability, masks off-notes, and enhances overall flavor balance, and Riza 35, a highly deodorized rosemary extract that ensures strong antioxidant protection in pet food without impacting taste or aroma.

Joassard adds: “Building on decades of experience in vanillin production for F&B, we have developed Rhovea Feed Vanillin, produced in our French site together with our Rhovanil brand. This ingredient is designed to address sensory and consistency challenges faced by modern pet food manufacturers, offering benefits for both pets and their ‘parents.’”

“For pets, it is about improving the palatability enhancement of pet foods, particularly dry dog food, off-note masking, especially in plant-based formulas that are currently on the rise. Furthermore, it offers flavor stability and consistency across dry, semi-moist, and wet formats, but also a harmonized taste across all the pet food categories.”

For pet parents, Rhovea Feed Vanillin can be used to offer pleasant flavor impressions, especially in growing pet snacks and treats categories, and the assurance of safety and quality, she notes. 

Discussing Riza 35, Dik says: “Syensqo brings its expertise in natural preservation to pet nutrition through Riza 35, a natural rosemary extract specifically designed to meet the high standards of today’s pet food market.”

Riza 35 enhances product quality by providing robust antioxidant protection throughout the shelf life, even under demanding processing conditions, he continues. “Because Riza 35 is carefully purified, it has minimal impact on taste and aroma, allowing the natural flavors of the pet food to shine through and enhancing palatability.”

“Its plant-based origin also supports clean label claims, giving pet owners confidence in the quality and transparency of the ingredients. With Riza 35, manufacturers can offer pet foods that are not only safe and nutritious, but also meet the elevated expectations of today’s discerning consumers.”

With additional reporting by Joshua Poole at Fi Europe 2025 in Paris, France