Essilor one of the 30 most innovative companies in the world
For the second year running, the company has been listed by Forbes, the prestigious American business magazine Essilor, the world leader in the optical-ophthalmology sector, was recently listed for the second year running among 30 of the "World's most innovative companies" by Forbes, the prestigious American business magazine. Once again, Forbes has recognized the Group's constant innovation in manufacturing ophthalmic lenses and ranks Essilor: • 28th worldwide • 4th in Europe • 3rd in France "Innovation, Essilor's growth engine for over 160 years, is at the basis of our performance and enables us to offer consumers the best correction solutions. We are proud about this new recognition by Forbes and want to share it with the teams all over the world that are committed to our mission to improve vision", commented Hubert Sagnières, President and CEO of the Essilor Group. With three Innovation and Technology centers and 550 researchers throughout the world engaged in developing the lenses of the future, and annual investments of 150 million euros, innovation is at the center of Essilor's growth strategy. Confirming this in a sector that is still young and has a promising innovation curve, is the fact that every year about 45% of Essilor's sales is for products launched in the last three years. Between 2011 and 2012, Essilor launched three important innovations: • Optifog, the first high-performance anti-fogging lens; • Crizal UV, the first clear correction lens that effectively protects the eyes from UV rays; • The most recent, Varilux S, reinvents the progressive lens to deliver unlimited vision for the farsighted. For its approach to innovation, the Group has a vast network of international partnerships with universities, industries and specialists in leading-edge technologies, such as Institut de la Vision and CNRS (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique) in France, and the University of Montréal in Canada. Forbes and the lists of the Most Innovative Companies The lists of 'The World's Most Innovative Companies' aim to identify the most avant-garde and promising companies at international level. The preparation of the lists is based on eight years of research by Clayton M. Christensen, a Harvard Business School professor and expert on disruptive innovation, in collaboration with Professor Jeff Dyer of Brigham Young University, and Hal B Gregersen, professor of leadership at INSEAD, the three co-authors of the recently published book 'The Innovator's DNA'. The lists are based on the "innovation premium", a parameter by which the stock market assesses the extent of a company's expected innovation today and in the future.
