Could you introduce Roquette’s presence in APAC?

Roquette is a family-owned global leader in plant-based ingredients operating in over 100 countries. Starting back in 1933, Roquette is a pioneer in plant protein and a leading provider of pharmaceutical excipients. Out of the 8,000 employees, a little over 2,000 are in the Asia Pacific (APAC) region. Five years ago, Singapore became the HQ for the region including an Innovation Center at the Biopolis area.

Why is Singapore a key spot for global marketing?

As part of our global structure, the head of the business unit is based in the US, our head of sales in France, and I am in Singapore, covering at once all three time zones and continents. The “Small Little Dot” located six degrees north of the equator, Singapore enjoys unparalleled connectivity with all centers of influence in APAC under eight hours flight. The other valuable advantage is the high-level, international talent pool concentrated in the country. The third angle to our decision was that our partners also set their HQs and some with manufacturing units in the city-state. Besides these core considerations, constituents like excellent infrastructure and ease of doing business are the icing on the cake for what makes Singapore an ideal business hub.

Could you familiarize our audience with Roquette’s product portfolio and main segments of growth?

We believe that every gram we sell of our plant-based excipients and active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) saves, improves, or sustains lives. We realize this mission by solving the toughest challenges of drug delivery because excipients are the carriers that enable drugs to be delivered in the right dosage form and facilitate patient compliance. Demographically, APAC has an astounding population of 4.3 billion people and growing. With the middle class becoming a lot more sophisticated and more indulgent with their needs, we see a rise in lifestyle diseases. Across age and demographic segments, APAC is an incredibly dynamic market with multiple growth trends. We are innovating to solve the toughest challenges of drug delivery and reaching breakthroughs. One of our recent launches is LYCAGEL™, a plant-based, soft-gel alternative to animal-derived gelatin that is an easy-to-use and convenient solution that ensures fast and reproducible scale-up for both nutraceutical and pharmaceutical applications

What defines Roquette’s sustainability strategy?

At Roquette, sustainability relies on the 3P model: people, planet, and profit. As a first step, we need to make sure that we onboard our employees to implement sustainability in how we operate, think, and act. But we must also be sustainable in a sustainable way; the profit element being key to surviving and thriving in the long-term. We first launched our sustainable development approach in 2008, and we have four key pillars defined – Innovating, Sourcing, Biorefining, Acting. The first two are sourcing from natural ingredients and innovating sustainably. Thirdly, we focus on biorefining or sustainable manufacturing while minimizing environmental impact. For example, one of Roquette’s plants in India has zero-liquid discharge facility, while another uses 20% solar energy from the 500 kW panels installed. And finally, we follow a principle of acting sustainably, especially with our local communities and at times of need; a good example is Roquette donated ICU beds and medical equipment to a local hospital in India to help the healthcare system cope with the COVID-19 crisis in 2021.

How do you observe the demand for plant-based nutraceuticals and excipients?

Demand for nutraceuticals has been on a growth path. In this part of the world, the more traditional cures like Ayurveda or the Chinese and Indonesian medicines, modern vitamins, minerals, and dietary supplements, botanically derived medicines are well-established. A truly natural product has both natural ingredients and a natural mode of delivery, rather than an active ingredient combined with a synthetic carrier. We are seeing a growing awareness around the synergy of a plant-based extract with a plant-based excipient, and this interest in natural excipients is driven by lifestyle changes and a booming middle class particularly in Asia.

Do you have a final message?

Roquette’s main priority is to be the number one trusted formulation and technology partner for our customers around the world; in sync with this vision, we offer the largest portfolio of plant-based excipients globally. We would like to leverage our position in Singapore and the biopharma capabilities at our Centre of Excellence, together with our global R&D network, to grow with our customers and bring forth sustainable solutions that save, improve and sustain lives, all in a sustainable way. We are convinced that together, we can unlock healthier futures.