Nowadays, consumers are demanding products that involve minimal risk. They want to be kept well informed at all times about any potential impact on man and the environment. While in the past, safety in application was the main priority, today the emphasis is on possible risks that might occur at any time during the product's life cycle. This means that criteria are becoming important that concern much more than the straight use of a product. The focus is increasingly on whether a product conforms to the fundamental principles of sustainable development and is acceptable to society.

We want to offer our customers - both processors and end-users - such ideal products. Already when developing a new product, we endeavor to make sure it can satisfy a variety of quality criteria.

The ideal product

  • does not entail any significant risks at any point during its entire lifespan,
  • is efficient in terms of resource use,
  • causes minimal emissions,
  • has a high benefit for the user,
  • is acceptable to society, and
  • gives an excellent return on investment.


In the real world of industrial production, this ideal product exists only rarely. Nevertheless, we have made it our aim to get as close to this ideal as possible. We want to do so in future with our entire range of products, products that will stand out from the others because of their highest possible level of quality: their "Product Excellence." By Product Excellence, we mean more than just the quality of the product itself or of the service connected with it, because we have also included "Public Value" in the assessment of our products. This additional quality parameter is governed by the interests and the expectations of all the social groups directly or indirectly connected to our company. In other words, we no longer define quality merely from the company's and the customer's point of view, but also from a social perspective.

Just how far we take this responsibility for our products was illustrated by our voluntary withdrawal of Lipobay®/Baycol® from the market in August 2001. Although this cholesterol-lowering drug has benefited innumerable patients by combating excessive cholesterol levels in the blood, one of the major risk factors for cardiovascular diseases, we have taken it off the market for safety reasons. It was a decision that had far-reaching economic consequences for our company, but for us preventive health care of patients has absolute priority.