Every day, Essity's brands and solutions cares for the hygiene and health of a billion people around the world. Innovation is key for Essity to continuously improve and expand our offerings for everybody and every body. Very welcome to this webcast, where we will be presenting how Essity innovates for profitable and sustainable growth. My name is Sandra Åberg. I am Head of Investor Relations, and I will also be your moderator today. We are sending live from Stockholm, and we have a full agenda. We are also very eager to hear all your questions, so please post them in the chat. All the slides that we show here today will be available on essity.com after. So to kick off the first session, I invite our CEO, Magnus Groth, and our CFO, Fredrik Rystedt, to tell us about how Essity's strategy is for value creation. The floor is yours.
Thanks, Sandra, and thanks for coming up with this topic, innovation. We had some discussions here before we started, and innovation is clearly something that it's exciting and very, very important for the future. I will start talking a little bit about Essity, our vision, our strategy, and our financial targets, and then hand over to really dig deep into innovation and how important that is for Essity going forward. Just to set the scene, Essity is a global leading hygiene and health company. We had sales of SEK 156 billion last year. We're active in 150 countries with 46,000 employees or 48,000.
We are organized in three attractive business areas with very different go-to market, very different customers and consumers, but also with many similarities and strong synergies, not least, as you will see today in R&D and innovation, very important synergies between all our different businesses. And as Sandra mentioned, this is what it's all about today, our fantastic brands and how they serve over a billion people every day who trust our brands. And what I would like to talk about now is how we want to increase, of course, that billion, and how we want to become even more trusted. Another way of measuring trusted is to look at market share. And as you can see here, our market positions, Essity in our branded sales are number one or number two in terms of market position in over 90% of our sales.
A very, very strong starting point. Out of that, in 60% of the cases, we are number one. If we look back three years until before the pandemic, our market shares have actually grown in over 60% of our sales during that period. A very, very strong starting point and development over the last couple of years. Now, looking forward, that's the basis, 1 billion customers, strong brands. Where do we wanna go? We have raised the bar on our vision. We want to be the undisputed global leader in hygiene and health. Of course, this is very ambitious, but what's important is that we can prove every year that we move towards this very, very ambitious target, or, or vision. Every year, we follow up, are we moving in this direction?
We will see how we measure and follow up on typical KPIs related to innovation and to R&D. Now, I'd like to move over to strategy, and of course, important is where to play. To put it simply, since we want to focus on innovation and R&D, we focus on the categories we're in, in hygiene and health, and very much in the categories we're in with the highest margins and lowest capital intensity. That's one of the reasons why we have decided to start a strategic review of our Consumer Tissue business in order to reduce that part of our business going forward. When it comes to channels, easily put, we want to be in the winning channels. We want to be where the customers and consumers are. This very much points us towards e-commerce.
We typically tend to be present in all categories. We work very decentralized with this since there are so many different categories, or different channels that we work in, in different markets and in different categories. Finally, geography. We leverage our strong base in Europe. We leverage our strong base in North America, in South America, and looking forward, we aim to grow quicker in North and South America and in East Asia. That's our focus in terms of geography. So if you put this together and look at the long-term portfolio direction, this would mean that going forward, we would have a higher share of sales from Professional Hygiene and Health and Medical.
They would account for approximately 25% each of sales, while Consumer Tissue would then be a smaller part of our overall portfolio, down from over 40% today to approximately 25% as well. The last quarter then, our Strong Personal Care businesses in Baby, Feminine Care, and Incontinence Care Retail. A kind of balanced portfolio, that's our long-term portfolio direction. How do we get there? How to win? Of course, with our people, that's the key. We know that we have incredibly engaged and committed staff members, and that's, that's of course, our best asset in order to continue to recruit and attract talent going forward, who want to develop and be their best within Essity. Diversity, equity, and inclusion is a key part of this. Brand building and innovation, we'll hear so much about that going forward.
I think it's enough for me to say that we focus on impactful innovation that can be measured in terms of innovation sufficiency and product superiority, which will be a big theme throughout the day. In our operations, since we operate 90 plants around the world in a complex supply chain system, it's key for us to be world-class when it comes to efficiency, service levels, and not least, have an everyday strong cost culture and working partnerships with our customers or with our suppliers and partners in this area. Sustainability has always been at the heart of Essity, and it's definitely a competitive advantage from an innovation perspective, but as much from a cost perspective. This goes hand in hand, as you will see in several examples throughout the day.
We tend to divide sustainability into social sustainability, where just being a leader in hygiene and health really shows how we contribute to this. Of course, in terms of environmental sustainability, our key commitment is to our Net Zero ambition when it comes to greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, and also reducing the amount of disposable products from plastic waste, which is a big topic in our categories today, but where we have strong solutions and innovation going forward. Moving over then to how this relates then to financials. We have a clear long-term financial targets. They have not changed. It's the same that you recognize. We feel very convinced and very committed to achieving these targets, and in most cases, that's been the case over the last couple of years.
Looking forward, we believe that we will achieve a combination of over 5% growth and a return on capital employed of above 17% by 2025. Why I'm so convinced this is the case is not least our track record, and what you see here is the development in terms of sales to the left and operating profit to the right.
Disregarding then the dent in the curve you see during the COVID years here, it's quite clear that we are on a very, very positive and strong trajectory, where the sales on the right, left-hand side has already recovered after the pandemic, while, as you can see, after nine months this year and when it comes to operating profit, we're already ahead of the full year last year and 2021, and way above the nine-month performance in our best year ever, 2020. So of course, that gives us confidence looking forward. So looking forward, where will the 5% growth come from? Primarily from volume, mix, and acquisitions, and some might say this is a big change, but actually, it's not a change, it's back to normal. This is how we've been growing historically over the last 10, 20 years.
Approximately, the 5% are built up on an average, 2% from volume, 1% from mix, and then 2% from acquisition-related growth. It will vary greatly between the years, but overall, that's where we're expecting this to come from. Our other important financial target, the 17% return on capital employed target, is also clearly within reach, and in the last quarter of this, third quarter of this year, we were already at 14.6%, and you can see the development there over the last five quarters. Actually, also, the longer term trend is quite positive. Again, when you look at the building blocks to the future here, it's about commercial excellence, structural efficiencies, and new growth initiatives, and might sound as a difference from the last couple of years, when we've mostly been focusing on recovering margins through pricing, pricing, pricing.
But again, this is back to how we've been through day-to-day improvements, working with structural improvements, sales efficiency, operational efficiency, innovation, premiumization, been growing, throughout the period of the pandemic, and then ensuing cost crisis, and so on, with an underlying improved structural profitability. And we feel convinced that now that we are out of the period of strong pricing, changes here and more looking into price management, all these efforts and all the plans we have for the future will make us achieve our 70% ROCE. With that, I would like to move over to innovation financials, and who could be better placed to talk about this than our CFO, Fredrik Rystedt? Welcome, Fredrik.
Thank you, Magnus. I will try and do exactly that. So I will talk about two things fairly briefly. The first, of course, is the size or amount of R&D and innovation, and how we allocate it. And the second topic relates to more measuring the success of our innovation efforts. So if I start with how we actually define how much to spend, we start off the strategic planning for the group. So we do this both on, of course, obviously, category level and also geography level. So what we do is we look at the characteristics of our geographies and the segments, and we define a growth target based on those characteristics.
Of course, when we have done that as a next step, what we do is we assess how much of the growth can be borne by the existing product portfolio, and the rest will actually need to come from innovation. So this is basically how we get to how much innovation and how many projects that we need to run. Going a bit deeper, as I just said, obviously, the profitability and growth characteristics of the category defines the total amount and the total project. Maybe not a surprise to you, we over-allocate, and Magnus alluded to that as well, that we over-allocate to the high-yielding categories that we have. If you look to the graph on the left here, you will see what you've seen many times before, our value creation matrix.
So if you look at the x-axis there, that's where you find the growth, and y-axis is where you have the return. And in that left-hand side, you see our assumption of where our categories are within those, within that combination. And to the right, you see the allocation of our R&D investments in the last three years. And obviously, it's quite clear that you see a strong link here. So we over-allocate to the high-yielding categories, very much in line with our strategy. And this is now on a holistic category level, but also within the categories, we do exactly the same thing. So we look at the product segment, and we allocate to where it basically creates the highest value.
So going over a bit, what does it look like if you look at the total, in this case, our both R&D and A&P? As you can see, on an absolute level, we have continuously increased the spending on both of these items. Maybe worth remembering here, we've actually done that also when times have been quite challenging, as an example here with the pandemic or hyperinflation. So we continue to invest at all times, basically, because it creates value. Now, one of the, of course, the, the features is that you always need to be cost-conscious and efficient in everything we do. Although, of course, R&D and innovation creates lots of value, we also need to be efficient in what we do. So in recent years, what we have done is we have gone to more or fewer and more widespread innovations.
That's in line with our global brand approach that we have, but each innovation has a higher net sales value in principle. So if you basically take the number of innovations times the value for each innovation, you can see that the value of our innovation portfolio is consistently increasing. So clearly, this is a strategy that brings better total value, lower cost, etc . So this is a bit on how we allocate and how much we spend. So let's talk about measuring the success, 'cause that's equally important. Obviously, Magnus showed our roadmap there, both in terms of growth and also, of course, in terms of how we get to our 17% target. And clearly, of course, we need to secure that we're actually delivering on these metrics.
So let me just give you start, well, perhaps start with a more superficial measure, so mix improvement in sales. So roughly, as you can see, just below 1% historically, and this is really, really good, not least if you look at the recent periods here, where we've also seen some down trading. But despite that fact, through innovation, we've been able to continue to actually increase sales growth. Now, that's good, but of course, provided that the margin is exactly the same in the innovations that we put on the market as the products that it replaces, then what this brings is higher sales and, of course, higher absolute profit. But as Magnus alluded to, it's not only that, we also aspire to have higher margins.
How we track that is looking at the gross margin that we have in our innovation portfolio, and then we compare it to existing gross profit. This slide that you're seeing here is showing exactly that. So if you look at the innovation portfolio that we have at this point of time, the margin, as you can see, is considerably higher in that innovation portfolio in comparison to the existing portfolio. These are estimates, and of course, to secure that we're not just guessing wrong or being too optimistic in our innovation work, we also track this retroactively to secure that the assumptions we're making are accurate. Another measure that we track is superiority, and of course, that's pretty obvious that this is beneficial.
And what I mean by superiority is basically what do consumers and customers think of our product in considering, of course, the characteristics of the product itself, but also brand and price, which is important. And as you can see from, from the graph here, we have a fairly significant, level of superiority. And you may then ask, "Okay, what about the rest of the 38% not being superior?" Well, there we are largely on par with the best competitor, not with the average, but the best competitor. So here, it's a good sign that we are successful in our innovation portfolio.... Now, I can show you many different, KPIs on, on, success, but that wouldn't be very productive. So I'll just show you this last one.
Once again, maybe attaching a bit to what Magnus was saying there, that we strive to put products on the market that is not worse than of course what they replace, but preferably better. So we need to have, of course, always have that in mind. And as you can see from the slide, more than 75% of the products we put on the market has basically a positive, sustainable footprint. So one of the measures we are quite proud of and an essential part of our sustainable journey.
So I'll stop here just with one final remark. I've talked about the financials from innovation that we have, the innovations that we generate internally, but we also, and that's perhaps easy to forget, but we also acquire innovation, we acquire new technologies. If you look at each and every one of these examples from the last couple of years, you can clearly see that many of them have actually brought some very, very healthy financial innovation and technology. So that's another part of what we do.
Thank you. Thank you, Magnus, and thank you, Fredrik.
Thank you.
So what I take with me from this is Essity's long-term portfolio direction and how we allocate R&D and A&P, as well as other investments, to grow in line and grow in the high-yielding categories. Also, very good to see the good numbers on superiority and sustainable solutions and increased gross margin. And I would really like to know more about this and talk to our head of innovation, Tuomas Yrjölä, later on to understand how this is achieved. But first, we're gonna talk to a key player when it comes to what trends Essity acts and innovates on. Welcome to this conversation, Sahil Tesfu, chief of strategy.
Thank you.
Good to have you here.
Thank you, Sandra Åberg.
So, my first question is: What trends are actually behind the strategy that Magnus and Fredrik just presented?
Yes, happy to talk about that. So first of all, important to maybe just first look at geographic trends when it comes to the categories that we play in. So the hygiene and health market is primarily concentrated in Western Europe, in the U.S., as well as in Asia. So when it comes to then also looking where the most part of the growth sits, of course, that can be found in the emerging countries, again, primarily in Asia, but also in Latin America. So our strategy then is to, of course, leverage that geographic footprint to the best ability.
So as Magnus said, we want to defend our strong positions in Europe. We also want to leverage them to continue growing in Europe. At the same time, we also want to look for more profitable growth opportunities in North America, in East Asia, as well as Latin America, and that is true across all of the business areas that we play in. Then maybe to your question, to also more broadly answer it when it comes to other mega trends-
Yes
... that are shaping our profitable growth strategy, let me maybe start by talking about demographics-
Yes
... for a second. So an interesting fact is that already in 2018, the population on this planet that was aged older than 65 outnumbered people on this planet aged lower than five years old. Also looking at the UN projections for future population growth, it's interesting to notice that actually, the population of people older than 65 until 2050 will double, and the population of people older than 80 is actually going to triple in the same timeline. Now, you might ask: Why is that relevant to Essity?
Of course, that's relevant because with an older population also comes an increasing prevalence of chronic conditions, and we have a lot of products and solutions in our portfolio that are helping to address these chronic conditions. Both, for example, when it comes to incontinence products and solutions that we sell, but also other products in our Health and Medical portfolio are relevant here. Another important thing with older population is also that we see an increasing care gap across the globe, and that's actually true across geographies. So the care gap, the caregiving support ratio is actually going to decrease, I would rather say maybe even drop, from six to one in 2011. Right now, we're at five to one, and by 2050, we can expect that number to be two to one.
That, of course, puts a lot of pressure on healthcare systems across the globe when it comes to cost pressure. At the same time, of course, also a lot of caregiving relatives, private people, are stepping in to take care of their loved ones. So our strategy is to not just win with healthcare professionals, but to also win with caregiving relatives with our products and solutions.
Wow!
Those are two examples.
Yes
... trends that are affecting our strategy.
That's interesting. What about sustainability and digitalization? Are you seeing anything of that?
Yes. So digitalization, also very important topic, of course, when it comes to mega trends. So first of all, of course, we see a lot of increasing digital touchpoints when it comes to our B2B, but also our B2C business. So being present, as Magnus said, in the relevant online channels to sell to consumers, caregivers, patients, and customers is important. But we're not just in online channels to sell, we're also there to engage and to do brand building.
That's again a key priority of the Essity strategy. Then we also see digitalization as a value creation lever across all of our business operations, and we're also constantly looking for opportunities to leverage digitalization, to become more efficient and to become more effective, from how we innovate to how we manufacture, to how we go to market. And then I think you also asked about sustainability.
Yes, yes.
That's, of course, another hot topic and Magnus also already talked about it. So sustainability is a key pillar of how we aim to win as Essity. Why is it a key pillar? Of course, there's a lot of external pressure on us when it comes to regulation, but also consumers, investors, and even technological innovation is progressing. So there's a lot of opportunity when it comes to sustainability, to drive value for the Essity group. And we have a very holistic framework in place, covering, as Magnus said, both social sustainability aspects, but also environmental sustainability aspects. And, again, it's a very holistic set of things, would go way beyond the time we have here now to-
Yes
-to discuss. The most famous one, of course, our Net Zero commitment, which we feel very strongly b ut it's not just that. We also take it a lot further than just that.
Wow! Thank you, Sahil. Lots of very interesting and favorable trends for Essity to capture. We will now meet the person in charge for how we innovate, based on the trends that Sahil just spoke about, and also how we achieve the superiority number that Fredrik presented. Very welcome, Tuomas Yrjölä, President, Global Brand, Innovation and Sustainability. Hi, Tuomas.
Hi, Sandra.
Can you tell us how you innovate for happy customers and consumers, please?
That's exactly what I will do. So thank you very much.
Thank you.
So Fredrik gave you a lot of interesting numbers. So what I'm gonna do now is I will present to you how do we deliver these numbers in the engine room? So if I start with this idea, which is that everything we do starts with the consumer, the customer, or the caregiver, as Sahil was saying before, and we've organized all of our operations around that. So we've built world-class innovation and brand-building capability, which allows us to scale, on one hand, very fast, all the capability in when it comes to delivering superior solutions or brand building, but at the same time, work very closely with the business units or business areas to respond to fast-changing needs in the marketplace.
The way we've done this is we've also built global innovation hubs, which allows us to be very close to various cultures, various fast-changing needs in the market, and allows us to pivot very fast, while at the same time, in the back end, again, ensure we drive a global scale across all of these hubs. I must say, we start everything that we do by understanding what are the unmet needs that the consumers and customers have. So we have a saying that we fall in love with the problems of our consumers and customers. We don't start with our solutions, and when we understand those barriers better, it helps inspire us to come up with innovations or solutions which really help take down those barriers.
And what I'm gonna show you, in a second is how we do this across our, our portfolio in a consistent way. I'll start with how we do it on our, core business and core brands, and go from there in terms of how we actually build the categories where we're in, through innovation. And last but not least, talk about how we use sustainability as a spark to really accelerate our innovation. So Fredrik talked about superiority, and I, I, I wanted to underline that we take a very holistic view in what it comes to superior experience. So on one hand, we certainly work on purely on our product performance, to ensure that we've got technically very high-performing products.
But equally, we know that working on the brand and the concept is a significant driver of, growth and value creation, and when we combine these two things together, both the brand and the product, great things happen. What you see here in the slide is an example of if you take away the brand, what the, what the purchase intent is in isolation, so purely blind product, and what kind of jump you see when we add our strong brand into it, and this is why we, we take a very holistic approach, in the way we built this. And I think a great example of when this all comes together is this one. It's our latest innovation on household towel, on Plenty, in the U.K. market.
And again, for us, we give ourselves credit on superiority when we see ratings like this from the consumers. So over 300 U.K. shoppers have tried our product, gone online, given it an average of 4.85 out of five rating, which is exceptionally high. And what really warms my heart is this consumer quote, where consumer is saying how great the product is, how it's more sustainable because it doesn't have a cardboard tube, how it's better value for money because you can actually decide yourself how much paper you use, and gives it a very, very strong recommendation. So this is when it all comes together: sustainability, product performance, value, combined with the strong brand, and this is what we strive for.
So going into now core business and how we drive innovation and brand, again, holistically, across the core. One of my favorite examples is the Feminine Care category. This is a category which is still very much carrying a lot of taboos and barriers for our consumers, and we have been now for a number of years been on a mission to eradicate all these taboos, both in terms of how we talk about a category, how we built the brand, as well as how we innovate. And most recent example is on our night assortment, and night continues to be still a really significant barrier for our consumers.
When we talk to women around the world, over 60% said that while they're on their period, the night or their sleep gets disrupted significantly, partially because of the anxiety that comes with it, but partially because products are not delivering fully the comfort and protection that they need. So what we did to address this unmet need is we designed a new superior product, which delivers better comfort, better fit, as well as better protection. And we combined this with very strong brand-building campaign called Periodsomnia, which really described and showed to the world what are these anxieties that consumers go through through the night, and then obviously offered the solution with it, with our latest product. So now I'd like to show you how the advertising looks like, so you get a better idea.
Libresse Goodnight. Maximum protection that stays powerful all night. Libresse Goodnight. Sleep fearless.
So this Sleep Fearless campaign is one execution of multiple campaigns we've done, which have been incredibly successful in the market, not only in delivering incredible value growth, so you see here, we've grown our top line on fem care on average 9% since 2017, and this has also catapulted us to market leadership positions. So if you went a few years back, we had about half of our portfolio where we were number one. We now have over 70% of our global sales where we're market leaders. So with this combination of strong product, strong advertising, with consistent support, you can see how we can organically grow the business.
And, in fact, Feminine Care just crossed EUR 1 billion in net sales, which is quite an incredible feat considering the business was about EUR 400 million just a decade ago. Another example where we're building really and driving the core business is on Tork. So here, the unmet need that we got from customers and end users was that a lot of-- Especially in high-frequency areas, washrooms run out of paper too fast, which reduces the hygienic standards, as well as filling some of these dispensers was quite cumbersome and complicated. So again, we unleashed an innovation team to attack this issue and came up with a solution where we basically compressed the paper, as you see with the picture in the middle, by 50%.
And what this allows us to do, together with a superior technology or dispensing system that we developed, is to increase capacity of dispensers by 250%. Not only did it do that, we also changed the way you load and fill the system, and in fact, we were able to cut the filling time to half for the staff, improving obviously, the productivity and efficiency of the operation, at the end customer. And of course, all this technical solution that we developed is super patented. So we have over 20 patents for this solution, which makes it very, very unique for the Tork brand. So you might be wondering, well, that's all nice, but how did it do in the market?
I'm happy to report that we've just crossed SEK 1 billion Swedish krona sales on the PeakServe platform. We're seeing significant growth and upside as we've sort of expanded the penetration from not only very high frequency or traffic areas like airports and stadiums, to more mid-sized venues as well. And we see significant growth runway still on this solution. So very, very exciting outlook ahead on PeakServe. Moving on to bathroom tissue. You might be wondering, how do you innovate on a category like bathroom tissue? And we often say that there's no boring categories, there's just boring innovators. And one good example how we've done this is an innovation called OdorBlock.
So the way we started this one was, again, going into consumer's home, looking at what are the barriers that consumers are still feeling or meeting. And we started in Latin America, and what we found out was over 70% of Latin American consumers in Mexico and Colombia still throw their toilet paper into a trash bin instead of flushing it. Now, the issue this creates is obviously a big odor problem. So we challenged our R&D and innovation team with a question on: how could the bathroom tissue help reduce this odor issue?
There's obviously been scented bathroom tissues for a long time, but we actually partnered externally with a technology provider, which gave us a perfume, which in fact, what it does, it blocks those sensors or receptors in your nose which smell the bad odor. So it doesn't block your nose completely, just those receptors that need to be blocked. And this has been a fantastic innovation that we've just launched across our bathroom tissue assortment in Latin America and are rolling it out in Europe. And it's driving, again, great differentiation in into the market and fresh news to provide superior experience.
Continuing into another example where those of you who have babies, I'm sure you've experienced, especially in the early months when the diet is very, very loose, at times, you do have accidents in the back of babies, to the detriment of parents. And these sort of explosions was a big, a big barrier that parents came to us and said, "We like your diapers, but is there anything you could do?" So we developed a unique solution in the back of the diaper called the Capture Pocket, which delivers a noticeable superiority, again, in use, and really improves the lives of both the babies as well as the parents.
And, you see there on the slide, a consumer quote that we just recently got, which was, "Thanks to these diapers, we've really escaped disgusting poop leaks up the back." And not only that, when we look at our recent market shares on, especially on the newborn sizes, which is very critical on Baby, we've grown our newborn share over 70% in Sweden. So seven out of ten babies that are born in Sweden come into Libero, and we're seeing significant share growth. And most importantly, we introduced this on the premium part, called Touch, and that's over 50% market share of all newborn babies right now, thanks to this innovation. So again, driving real impact in the market.
So the examples I just showed are more on the core business, and they all allow to bring new users into Essity. But the other thing we're very focused on is how do we grow the overall pie or the overall size of the category where we operate? And great example of this is the men incontinence category, where TENA is the leader, but the category is still very, very underdeveloped. So in fact, one in four men, over 40%, suffer from some sort of incontinence issue, but the reality is only one in ten men use an appropriate product for this. And we started digging in deeper into why is this? And there were really two barriers.
One was men were not aware that there are solutions to this issue, and the second thing was men have great do-it-yourself skills, and they found all sorts of creative solutions or compromises to try to take care of the issue, such as using bathroom tissue products, or at times products designed for Feminine Care. So we took on that challenge and said, how do we address these issues?
By completely revamping our assortment, making it more masculine in terms of both the look, the color, the names of the products, such as Shields or Protectors, which are more masculine. We introduced washable, absorbent underwear also for men, which is a smaller habit change. We did all this and combined it with advertising, which is addressed to really explain to men that, "Hey, there's solutions out there, and TENA is here to help." So why don't we look at the TENA Men ad so you get the idea?
Hello, I want to talk to you about my urine leakage, but first, let's get comfortable. Ah! That's better. TENA Men absorbent protectors are designed for men. Fits discreetly into my underwear. Hmm, you'd never know. They protect like TENA, so no more dribble dramas. TENA, TENA, TENA Men.
So this combination of taboo-breaking advertising combined with this new renewed assortment is driving significant growth for us on Men. We're growing 15% sales growth, CAGR, and I was just looking at the latest numbers how the market is growing. In Germany, we're close to 20% volume growth on the market. So it's a very, very responsive model of this, combined with advertising, superior product activated. And it's great because not only does Essity win with it, but also our retailer partners win as we grow the cake and the category size overall. Last but not least, sustainable solutions. Fredrik showed you the numbers, that a big part of our innovations that we bring help drive sustainability, reduce our CO2, or environmental impact.
The way we do this is it's a very interlinked part of our innovation, so it's not a side activity we do, but it's very integrated into all the innovations that we do. We have a model called the Three Rs, and, and the Three Rs stands for reducing, reusing, or recycling, and we're activating all of these three different vectors with our innovation. Be it reducing the material we use or taking out plastic or reducing the consumption in use, for example, with, with Tork dispensers, with one-sheet dispensing, or be it reusing, where we've, of course, activated or increased a lot our assortment on fully washable or reusable products.
Across Inco, feminine, we have hybrid products on, on Baby care or recycling, where probably our best example is the Tork Paper Circle, where we collect the paper from the washrooms and bring it back to our mills and create new paper out of it. We have over 500 customers already on Tork Paper Circle, which shows the potential and the need also from our customers to take their sustainability efforts to next level. So all of this, when we bring it together, brings our portfolio of superior offers and, and solutions to 62% of sales. We have very clear targets by category where we want to be. We're not done yet. We've got a great plan to address further unmet needs to keep increasing this number.
But as Fredrik already showed you, we've done significant progress in increasing the impact and performance of our overall offers as a company. And all of this all of this brand building, all of this innovation, leads us to very strong leading brands that consumers and customers trust across the world. And what's quite remarkable is we've got a capability to build very scaled, global, big brands, where we've taken both Tork and TENA from over SEK 1 billion to crossing the SEK 2 billion mark, and we see significant growth potential. We've taken businesses like the Feminine Care that I talked about from SEK 0.5 billion- SEK 1 billion. We've scaled a lot, the Consumer Tissue brands, even if they have different brand names. We've scaled the way we drive the products and innovation and the brand positioning together.
And then we've got a portfolio of very locally relevant brands, where we still see significant upside. So we still see a lot of runway across all of these three different portfolios or buckets of brands, and we're just getting started because we still see so many opportunities to break barriers and meet these unmet needs that are out there. Thank you, Sandra.
Thank you, Tuomas. So many great innovations, and I really, really love our brands. I actually have a question from the chat, and it's regarding artificial intelligence. When it comes to AI, how do you use that in your function?
Yeah, so that, that's a big question, but we, a bit like with innovation, with AI, we've started with user cases. So starting with very specific user cases, where can we leverage AI really to improve our productivity? And I would say two areas, especially when it comes to brand building. One is on overall efficiency. So of course, with generative AI and AI, we can develop marketing assets in lightning speed versus before. So we're seeing significant cut down in time it takes, as well as the cost it takes to deliver marketing assets. But the other one is effectiveness.
Thanks to AI, we can be much more targeted to our audience, and we can even change our marketing message based on what we know on the customer, instead of what we used to call spray and pray approach, where you just broadcast advertising. Now you actually change the messaging based on the end user. But we're only scratching the surface. There's a lot of exciting things happening. We're learning new things every week.
Okay, good to hear. Good luck.
Thank you.
Thank you very much. A majority of the solutions that Tuomas just presented are being produced in our own production sites all over the world. It's time for Donato Giorgio, President, Global Supply Chain, to tell us about how innovation is helping Essity to reach best-in-class supply chain. Welcome, Donato.
Thank you, Sandra.
Great to have you here.
Thank you very much. Thank you.
Can you please, is it possible for you to give us the road to supply chain success in 10 minutes?
Absolutely.
Okay, thanks.
It's so great, the activity that is going on in the supply chain to enable the innovation and all the great activity this my colleague have been speaking up to now. When we talk the end-to-end supply chain leading now and in the future, we talk about from procurement. So an important part of our value creation is also coming in collaboration with suppliers to work every day to find innovative materials, best cost-efficient material, and overall also to improve the cost in use. Of course, itself goes by itself that about responsible sourcing. This is to really say that the procurement part and the supplier part of our value chain is very important for innovation now and in the future.
When we move then to manufacturing and engineering and technology, in the manufacturing, for us, the most important thing is to be best in class on our health and well-being and safety for our people in our plant. Essity has a purpose to remove barrier to well-being, and of course, we have to be role model in our factories. With our I Care program, we really aim every single day to become better in safety and become best in class in our industry, but also worldwide. Really to support the innovation, one important element is the production in the product innovation platform. The concept of platform in technology and manufacturing is very important to ensure that we have agile innovation.
We can really module all the different things that we introduce on our product, fast, in a cost-effective way, and also ensuring that we have right quality at the beginning. It's also very important to develop the process of our paper machines or in Personal Care in order to use shelf-ready technologies, but enable them to be leading innovation activities. When we move to best-in-class manufacturing, the TPM, the Industry 4.0, it's for our operation is of primary importance to really be state-of-the-art in the way we work, but also implementing the latest practice of Industry 4.0. With that, we have an advanced use of all the sensory data capture on production line. We have best in class with waste reduction and quality control, the total quality system.
We are really moving very fast towards 100% digitally enabled quality control. Very important is to move then to the Industry 5.0. We are introducing artificial intelligence for our maintenance and predictive maintenance system to optimize the cost of maintenance and the cost of our equipment. All of this together, of course, goes to reduce the total CO2 and the footprint of our operation. But I think it's good to watch a video from one of our operation directors who talk about this.
Digitalization plays a key role in improving our supply chain. By using technologies, advanced sensors, artificial vision cameras, we have been able to have continuous process control. With the implementation of cameras, we have online controls that allow us to have a constant quality control of our products.
For us, digitalization is not just about technology, it's about involving the shop floor people. Digitalization also means reusing, recycling resources, decreasing waste, improving energy efficiency, so focusing on sustainability in our circular industrial journey, minimizing our environmental impact. Another great example is our supply chain planning center of excellence in Barcelona, where we are bringing a better visibility with the analytics at all levels of the business, reducing lead times, reducing stocks, and being an end-to-end connected and agile supply chain.
It is also great to see how Miriam gave a perfect bridge to what is for us, at the end, in the end-to-end supply chain, our end objective, which is the customer fulfillment. Optimize great experience, delight customers at the right cost, with innovation or with the continuity of, of the product. And there, in our planning and customer fulfillment center, it's very important to really... We're very proud to share that we are on the forefront of implementing a planning control tower to have data visibility using latest systems and manage the supply chain in advanced way. And we just saw during the COVID time, the big advantage of leveraging on this advanced supply chain management system.
Transportation smart hub, where all our transport worldwide are managed in a digital and visual way in order to optimize cost, but also reduce the number of trucks that we put on the road to improve sustainability, and have a state-of-the-art logistics operation. This is all important to stay in the forefront of a customer experience. And I will leave Ilham, our Global Vice President, Supply Chain and Logistics, to give you a bit more information about this.
One great example of digitization in Essity is our Smarter program, where we've been looking at all our transportation processes that were spread locally and very manually driven. We have centralized them, standardized them, and moved completely to touchless digital processes, where we are handling more than 66 countries from our central hub in Barcelona. This has been achieving best-in-class results and best-in-class approaches that many companies are now looking at us to learn and reapply.
Now, we are very proud of what we are doing now, and our Essity is on the leading, the industry on this. But, we are constantly working to improve our future, and to improve our future, in leading in the environmental sustainability part. This is sustainability that takes care from the raw material, to the process of transformation, to the way of deliver. We have many proof point that this company is really reinventing the game and bringing the, this industry really in the circular economy and Net Zero of the hygiene, industry. So just as a proof point, many things that we are putting together is, alternative fiber usage coming from, agricultural waste to be used directly in our production is unique worldwide.
We are then experimenting and putting together and using, in reality, different type of energy, like geothermal, green energy, fossil fuel-free production, in putting together in order to make sure that, we are setting the type of production for the future that, minimize the CO2, but also optimize the cost of production, and also reduce the capital intensity of this industry. As I said, there are different elements that together should show how we are really working to change the game in every part of the supply chain. I would like to let Elena Viviani, our Technology Director, to share one of the key element of our transformation in tissue, which is about taking out water from our production.
Solving the water dilemma is the task of a passionate team of experts in R&D and technology at Essity. By reducing water in the making of tissue, we drastically cut energy needs with positive impact on manufacturing costs. We enable carbon neutrality. We hugely simplify the process, thus reducing investment costs. And of course, we take care of water scarcity. Today, we are driving a roadmap of multiple breakthrough initiatives, some of them already in prototyping phase, and we are moving forward to transform tissue industry.
This is something that Essity has had a dream years ago, now is becoming a vision, and then is a plan, and now we are really making it happen. We announced a few months ago our partnership with Voith in developing the machine of the future, but this is just one of the many initiatives on how we are really pushing to reinvent the future. Then, having said that, I give back to you, Sandra.
Thank you, Donato. Thank you for sharing so many good examples of how you innovate in supply chain. Great to see, and also very interesting to meet your teams. They share the same passion as you do.
Thank you very much.
Thank you. So, both Donato and Tuomas touched upon how digitalization and AI are helping them to leverage in their different function. To give you an update now on how these tools are impacting Essity and our industry, I welcome Carl Magnus Månsson, CDIO here at Essity. Welcome, CM.
Thank you so much.
How are you?
I'm fine. What a day!
Good. So you are responsible for Essity's digitalization journey. How do we leverage digitalization and AI?
I would say we're doing great, and just, just listening to Tuomas, and Donato, of course, on what they did right a nd what they talked about, I think is a perfect example of the strategic intent we have. So we build sort of central capabilities, but then we ensure that we deploy them close to where they add value, whether it's in customer interfacing roles or in process-related efficiencies. So I think that was a perfect pitch for what I do.
Okay, perfect. And how innovative do you think we are when it comes to AI as a company?
I think better than average, I would say.
Okay.
I mean, looking at AI in particular, right? Of course, there are several flavors of that. We've been working with AI for quite some time in more traditional AI type of enabled functions. Of course, entry of GenAI, which takes things a bit to the next level. We have quite a lot of use cases, as Tuomas explained, that we're working on, so I think we're doing quite well. At the same time, of course, we want to protect ourselves and doing the right things.
Perfect. A question I get sometimes from investors is around how disruptive AI is to Essity and to our industry. How would you answer that question?
I think there are several answers to that question, right? I mean, of course, it could disrupt certain parts of our processes. I think that's true for all innovation, you know, both digital and non-digital. On the other hand, you have to think about from the bigger perspective, right? Then, of course, I think our industry might not be disrupted, but I think we have to do things in a different way, and keeping on innovating is critical for that, right? And I think later on today, we'll also look a bit at our digital products in itself, right? And I think it's a clear example of how digital could innovate, and AI is part of that.
Okay, very interesting and good to hear that Essity has a very solid approach toward AI.
Thank you.
Thank you. You could perhaps argue that we have saved the best for last: how Essity innovates for better health. Joining us now to present this is Ulrika Kolsrud , President, Health and Medical. Welcome, Ulrika.
Thank you.
Can you please tell us how Health and Medical innovates for profitable growth?
I can, of course, of course.
Thank you.
So, now you have listened to how we innovate for happy customers and consumers, for stronger brands, for best-in-class supply chain, and for reduced climate impact. But we also, as Sandra said, innovate for better health. That is to enable people with, for example, fractures or surgical wounds, to heal as quickly as possible, but also to empower people that live with chronic conditions to lead healthy and active lives. There are more and more people to innovate for. As Sahil said, the prevalence of chronic conditions is increasing, and the aging population is driving demand, both in incontinence care as well as in our medical solution categories. For us to drive as successful innovations as possible, we work to delight the various stakeholders that influence the choice of solutions.
So the payers, like healthcare authorities, the care providers, and then I'm talking about the professional caregivers, like doctors and nurses, as well as the family carers, and of course, the patients, the consumers, the one who lives with the condition. One of those persons is Sarah. Sarah lives with lymphedema, which is a chronic lymphatic condition, that is causing swelling of arms or legs. And you will now hear what she has to say of one of our recent JOBST innovations.
lymphedema is a progressive disease and can be quite unpredictable sometimes. It requires constant adaptation and a lot of resilience. My lymphedema fluctuates and flares up. I can have good days and bad days. It can be a really hard thing to navigate physically and mentally, but with the right tools and support, it is manageable. JOBST garment has helped me to live my best life with lymphedema. I'm comfortable, and I'm not constantly reminded of my condition.
I'm well informed about my compression options, and I can get on with things I want to do without limitations. And all of this while I fulfill my medical needs at the same time. To me, the latest innovation from JOBST, JOBST Confidence, it really symbolizes what's possible when manufacturers truly understand and work with patients, innovating to make their lives with chronic disease better.
You need to feel and wear JOBST Confidence to really understand just how different this garment is to other compression and why this is such an important innovation that helps lower the barrier to wearing compression. Its unique contour fit technology gives an even more individualized fit, and it does this by following the body's natural contours even more accurately. This technology is so important and opens up a really new feeling in compression, like you forget you're wearing it because it's so soft and comfortable. It's this kind of innovation that truly makes a difference for people like myself.
This next generation compression garment is targeting people with mild or moderate lymphedema, which is the largest user group and also the point of market entry. So a very important target group for us to strengthen our leading position. This next generation garment furthermore supports a 12% growth rate in compression therapy. And there you see the 12% growth rate in compression therapy. And it also cements our position as innovation leaders in this category. Also, in wound care, we have some very innovative and unique technologies that gives us the right to win.
One of them is Sorbact, this antimicrobial technology is helping to prevent and manage infections, something that is of high relevance to healthcare authorities, because they want to avoid the high cost of care that comes with infections, and they want to fight antimicrobial resistance. Now you're gonna listen to Inger. Inger is a previous nurse, specialized in wound care, and now she works in Essity. And she's gonna tell you exactly what makes Sorbact such an effective and important innovation.
Wound infections are something that you really want to avoid, as they delay healing and are painful for the patient. As a healthcare professional, the goal is therefore to prevent wound infections and, at the same time, lower the usage of antibiotics. Our Sorbact technology is clinically proven to effectively prevent and manage wound infections. Most antimicrobial dressings use chemicals that kill bacteria, but with a risk of triggering resistance.
Sorbact instead reduces bacteria with a physical mode of action, offering a surface that is more attractive for bacteria to bind to than to the wound bed. The technology can be used across patients of all ages, for children as well as for elderly. For healthcare professionals, it is very easy and safe to use, as you don't need to worry about side effects.
Evidence from using Leukomed Sorbact following cesarean sections shows a 65% risk reduction of getting an infection, less antibiotic therapy needed, and 58% cost reduction in treatment compared to the standard dressing group. The benefits Sorbact brings to patients, healthcare, society, have not gone unnoticed. In 2022, the Sorbact technology was listed by Life Science Sweden as one of the 20 most important Swedish innovations in modern time. Of course, we continue to upgrade and extend our assortment with this fantastic technology.
Did you hear that? One of the 20 most important innovations in modern times, Swedish innovations. It's quite remarkable. Well, as you heard, Sorbact is certainly making a difference to patients, to healthcare, and to society. It also makes a difference to our business, and that goes beyond being a growth engine, growing above 20% year-to-date. With the unique properties that it has, and also the health economic benefits that it brings, it justifies a premium pricing, and the uniqueness also makes it serve as a door opener for our sales force, making it more easy for them than to come in and sell the full, broader portfolio. Also, it positions us as a leading player in advanced wound care.
Now, Inger talked about that we continuously innovate on the Sorbact technology and the Sorbact platform, and this to continuously leverage and enhance differentiation and superiority of our premium offers is something that is important across categories. A good example of that in the incontinence care category is the TENA Flex. TENA Flex is a long-term innovation that we've had in Essity that we continue to upgrade, and we continue to build on it continuously. It's also one of the drivers behind the very good mix development that we have in the category. TENA Flex is a favorite among many healthcare professionals, and now you're gonna hear exactly why.
When we use TENA Flex, we quality assure all of our patients that we have. We have measurements that continue for three days, where we need to know what absorption capacity they need, what size they need based on their hip measurement and so on, and then we assess which size fits best for that individual. What we have found to be extremely important here is the fixation, that it is stretchy, that it can be adjusted both forward and backward, and that it is so easy to put on. The stretch in the sides allows it to be fixed very well. Even if they move around or shift positions, it should stay in place all the time. It should not move, but it should be as comfortable as possible.
You should not feel like you have something that squeezes or presses, or that causes irritation from tape or anything like that. What has also been easy is when you have, for example, someone who is wheelchair-bound or needs to sit on an elevated toilet seat or something similar, you can fix TENA Flex while sitting with the belt around the stomach, and then when they stand up in a turner or something similar, you can fix it more easily around the buttocks and pull it up. So it is never a problem to fix it, even when they are sitting on the toilet, for it to be easy. It is much more time-efficient to have TENA Flex. We avoid the unnecessary changes because it leaks and does not fit properly. It has been an incredible advantage in many ways for us.
So TENA Flex is part of our holistic offer that makes us the best partner to healthcare in their ambition to provide good quality care at the lowest possible total cost. And besides the wide range of absorbing products and skincare products in this holistic offer, we also have digital solutions like TENA SmartCare as an important element of that value proposition. And you might have picked up in the Q3 reporting that we now have equipped also TENA Flex, the product you just heard about, with the SmartCare functionality. Now, you heard one voice from our healthcare professional customers. An equally important target group is the family carers. And as Sahil said initially, the number of family carers is increasing because of healthcare being under pressure, both when it comes to budgets and staffing....
One of the former First Ladies of the United States, Rosalynn Carter, once said that there are only four kinds of people: the ones who have been caregivers, those who are currently caregivers, those who will be caregivers, or those who will need caregivers. In fact, today, one out of five people are providing care for a loved one, and we, of course, want to be there to serve their needs in the best possible way. An initiative on that journey and in that ambition is the launch of Caressa, a digital solution that assists family carers. It brings together different care essentials like doctor's appointments, medications, jobs to be done, on a subscription-based app. It also enables multiple family members to coordinate and collaborate around the care for their loved one.
Caressa has the potential to be an own revenue stream, but it also has the potential, of course, to attract family carers to our current solutions and offers within the Health and Medical categories. Now we're gonna stay in the digital world, but we're gonna remove and go back and, and let our attention go back to the end user, because we continuously try to find new ways to support people that live with chronic conditions, to manage their conditions, in order to lead healthy and active lives. We have a very good example of that in something that we are going to launch in the beginning of next year, the TENA Bladder Sensor. To talk about that, we have with us here in the studio today, Axel Nordberg, who is our Global Director for Digital Solutions in Incontinence Care. So welcome, Axel.
Thank you very much.
Why don't you start by sharing what it is we are going to launch in the beginning of next year?
Absolutely. The TENA bladder sensor is essentially a wearable sensor that monitors the bladder and the volume and sends a discreet notification to the user when to go to the toilet, basically. And we acquired the technology in 2020, and we have developed it for adults in our use cases. We have also worked with Apple to make a user experience on the iPhone.
So it will be on the Apple Watch?
On the iPhone and on the Apple Watch. Absolutely right. That meets the needs and expectations of our consumers.
Okay, sounds very exciting. What are the consumer benefits, then?
Well, we know very well that people are extremely constrained by continence and incontinence. So, we know that they're even refraining from go on the street and go out in the city and to spend time with friends and family because afraid of leakages. And for many of these people, this will be a game changer. By knowing when to go to the toilet, they can manage their continence in a completely different way than before and actually avoid the leakage before it happens.
I know the consumer research looks fantastic.
It does. We have extremely encouraging results from our clinical trial that we just finalized. For example, 80% of the in the study used the notification to plan for the next toilet visit, and 77% felt more in control of their incontinence by using the sensor. And this is just after one week, so this is extremely encouraging, and it's also fascinating to listening to the testimonials, where we hear that they actually become free from leakages by using it, and in fact, they don't want to give it back after the study.
Obviously very good for the user. What about for our business? What are the impacts on the business?
With the TENA bladder sensor, we are expanding in prevention, and this of course will strengthen not only our relevance, but also our brand and further strengthen our sustainability agenda. We will also broaden our offering towards the target groups of consumers and urologists, which will be positive for our total business.
Certainly will. So as Axel mentioned, with this innovation, we are tapping into prevention, which plays to our strategy to expand along the continuum of care. And this example, together with the Caressa initiative I talked about, are examples of how we expand through innovation. The other three innovations that you, that I've talked about, are reflecting how we strengthen the core through innovation. So how we enhance differentiation, enhance superiority to justify premium pricing, and always staying in the lead to strengthen our positions. I hope that I've also conveyed how we base our innovations on insights about patients, consumers, payers, and caregivers, all key stakeholders when we innovate for better health. By delighting them, we break barriers to well-being, and we accelerate profitable growth.
Thank you, Ulrika, and thank you, Axel.
Thank you.
Thank you for sharing so many good examples of how you're driving innovation and growth in Health and Medical. Very interesting. I hope that you found these presentations as interesting and entertaining as I am, but I also hope that we have raised your curiosity and that you have many questions for us now, because it's time for Q&A, and please post your questions in the chat, and see you in a few seconds. ... Thank you. So it's time for Q&A. The first question is actually on culture. We have seen many examples of innovation in all parts of Essity, and we have also met your teams driving innovation. How do we, as a company, nurture a culture which drives innovation and continuous improvement and change? Who would like to go first?
I'll start.
Yes.
I'll start. I think one important thing is to have diversity of thought and perspective in the teams. Both having people with different backgrounds, but also work across the value chain with different functions working together. And then, of course, to build an inclusive culture, create an environment of psychological safety so that everyone brings their full... All their ideas and all their perspectives and knowledge to the table. That's one thing. And also working with external parties, that we cannot do all ourselves. It's also about bringing in external input and collaborate with suppliers and partners and customers, and so on.
Maybe I can also build on,
Yeah.
What Ulrika just said. So I think also in line with our purpose of breaking barriers to wellbeing, so we self-identify as barrier breakers. We like to refer to our employees as barrier breakers, and they also identify as such. Of course, it starts with internal barrier breaking when you want to break barriers to well-being, and innovation is a key aspect of how that comes to life, I would say.
Interesting. Donato?
Yeah, I would say it's in line with what Sahil said. The real energy of our culture is that people wants to do the good things for the people and for the planet. And this gives really great energy to the teams, that they work on a seamless way to make all the things that you have seen happen and give the contribution to our mission.
Maybe finally, we have a very long-term perspective. I mean, some of the innovations you heard about here were launched seven years ago, and they continue growing double digits year-over-year, and it takes, I mean, typically three to five years. I mean, the last sensor, we acquired that company three years ago, and we're launching it on a big scale now. So we have a very long-term perspective, and many of the biggest products that we have today were developed, I mean, over 10 years ago and still growing very nicely year-over-year.
Interesting. Question for you, Sahil. We talked about the different trends that are impacting Essity. What would you say is the most impactful trend that we're seeing today and that Essity is exploring?
Ooh, maybe difficult to pick one particular trend, but maybe I would say the two trend areas that have the most impact across the businesses that we operate in or the industries that we compete in. I would say are sustainability trends and also digitalization trends. I think we talked a lot about sustainability today as well how it changes what we sell, but also how we produce things, how we bring them to market, and how we market the products that we have.
So sustainability, I think, is an example of a trend that really cuts across. The second one, digitalization. I'd also talked a little bit about that, and of course, typically what comes to mind is e-commerce when we talk about digitalization. But of course, for us, it's much more than just that. It's also about bringing digital solutions to market, as Ulrika said, that are also helping with a lot of the challenges in the hygiene and health markets that our patients, consumers, and customers are facing. It's a driver for value creation from their perspective, and at the same time, we can also use digitalization to become more effective and efficient across our business operations. Those two I would pick.
I have a question here on digitalization, and it's about: how has digitalization impacted your innovations, for example, with regards to design for e-channel? Do we design products differently for e-commerce? Tuomas?
I mean, I can take it. I mean, products per se, no, but what we're very focused on is, obviously, with e-commerce, sales and marketing blend together. So what we do is we, we use e-commerce a lot in terms of both the brand building explaining obviously how our products work, as well as then providing the right solution and then right pack configuration. Be it, for example, TENA. We have a monthly pack, which is on a repeat purchase basis, but the product in itself is still the same.
The other thing we do is... And I showed the example from U.K., we follow very closely what our consumers and customers are saying about us and how well the product performance really is in terms of the experience. 'Cause there's no better way than looking at online, where you get the good and the bad, which also sparks then future innovation on, you know, where we can improve.
And I would also like to add that, for the channel, to reshape your supply chain and, leverage on the digitalization is fundamental. Because, you cannot pretend to run the supply chain on e-channel with the tools that you had in the past.... So as I said before, the control tower, data visibility, data management, transport optimization, that becomes much more smaller lot versus full truckload is fundamental. And this is something that we believe is going to be a competitive advantage of Essity because it's a different type of world.
Good. Interesting. We have a question on male incontinence or maybe female incontinence. Male incontinence is an interesting growth opportunity, but female incontinence is still a much larger part of the market. Can you share some innovations in female incontinence, Tuomas?
Yeah, I mean, so both, both segments have significant growth opportunity. And when it comes to the female side of things, we've, we've pretty much touched every product that we sell with innovation in the last three to four years, and starting from very light incontinence all the way to the heavier incontinence. And what, what we've really focused on is, number one, make our products more discreet, more feminine, more comfortable to use, which has been a barrier on TENA, which we've sort of slowly and surely eradicated with our products.
The other thing we've done is ensure that the products we design are more cost competitive also to make. So that, you know, when Donato runs his lines, they run at high speed. A nd the products are designed for platforming, as well as, you know, very high, obviously, consumer preference. So, we have a very competitive assortment with superiority now also on the female side. And as said, that category is also still growing double digit. So yeah, in the sense of gender balance, we see opportunity in both.
Okay, great to hear. Then on sustainability, I mean, we have committed to science-based targets one and two and three, as well as Net Zero. We talked about that. But when it comes to Scope 1 and 2, I mean, you have a big responsibility here, of course, and you shared.
We are all together.
Yeah, we're all together. But you shared a lot of different initiatives. What do you think is really important here? What's game changing, you think, of all those initiatives?
In tissue, it is to take out water out of our process.
Okay.
The world still does tissue like the Egyptians were doing 3,000 years ago, using a lot of water to form the fibers, and then you need a lot of energy to dry it. What we are in the forefront of the research to do, of course, in strong partnership with R&D and with technology, is to reinvent this concept and to invent the way of making hygiene product of the new millennium and of the circular economy.
Because taking out water, you take out gas, and you don't need this. Then you can take out the CO2 because you can do electrification, like we are demonstrating that we are doing in some of our plants. In personal care, it is, we already can be, CO2 neutral now in Scope 1 and 2, because it's all electrified. We basically don't use gas in personal care. It is about finding a new way to, collect fluid and retain fluid and, try to make the product in a way that then it's easier, compostable and recyclable. The famous concept of the Three Rs that, Tuomas shared before.
Okay.
And we think that this company is really on the forefront of this type of innovation that the world really needs.
Okay. Interesting.
Right, Tuomas?
Absolutely right.
Okay, perfect. Then I have a question here on Health and Medical. It's an important growth area for Essity, but how do you prioritize growth between your different categories that you have?
Well, we have-
Innovation and R&D, etc ?
Yeah. Well, we have the ambition to strengthen position across the different categories. So we innovate sufficiently across the different categories, which is important. And then, of course, you could say that if we look at wound care is the area where we have higher class products to a higher degree from a regulatory environment perspective. And then, of course, that requires more clinical evidence and so on, to bring the products to market, and thereby more costly from an innovation perspective. So, thereby, I allocate a bit more on that side for that reason. Innovation is important for all the categories to grow them.
You see growth potential in all different categories?
Yes.
Okay. Then we have a question regarding co-branding. Do you see potential for co-branding in your consumer categories? Would it be possible to cooperate with leading fashion brands, for example, in your leakproof offering?
Yeah. I mean, the way we look at co-branding is we look at whenever the brand might be a barrier for growth or adding another brand could help accelerate growth, we're always open, open for doing that. So, we've actually, we've done some partnerships with, with our, the startups, that we've acquired such as Modibodi. So in fact, Modibodi is in partnership with Puma.
Oh, that's fine.
Which is a nice way of bringing a athletic brand, addressing a barrier, with our products and then reaching out to new target audiences. So we are experimenting and doing it already in parts of the portfolio. And again, whenever there's a good opportunity or match, I'm sure we'll do it in the future too.
Interesting... Then, just a question on Baby diapers. Baby diaper innovation and product superiority is very clear. How can these products build higher household penetration outside the Scandi region? Thanks. So we are strong with Libero in Nordics.
Yeah, we've got on Baby care, we've got obviously a very strong position in Nordics. We've got a presence as well in the French market, where we're leveraging more of the Lotus umbrella brand, which is a very strong tissue brand, and we've expanded that into Baby. But we also have a few very strategic retailer brand businesses, such as, dm in Germany, where in fact, the way the consumer would describe it to you in, in Germany is it's, it's like any brand, and we've had a very long-term partnership in there.
So we're able to, drive really, accretive, growth, both in obviously in the branded business, but in few selective, branded, retailer brand partners that are more long-term and, and fit the sort of financial model that we're looking for. So I think we've got quite a nice balance in Europe from that point of view.
Yeah, that sounds good. So the last question, maybe for you, Magnus, regarding the long-term portfolio that we aimed to move in that direction. What do you see as possible acquisitions on that road? In which areas?
Yeah, and of course, you never know about... I've been listening so closely to what all the colleagues said here. I'm completely absorbed by all the wisdoms that we've heard here. But yeah, quickly moving on to acquisitions. The acquisitions we've done over the last three to four years are very good examples of what we'd like to continue doing. Very much in advanced wound care, in Health and Medical, in general, in Health and Medical, we're very interested in making acquisitions.
In Professional Hygiene, also not directly in tissue, but in adjacent areas like the wipers company we acquired a couple of years ago, Legacy Converting. But there are also actually opportunities in, in the consumer goods arena, and I, I guess the, the best examples here could be Knix and Modibodi. They are really, really contributing to our growth in Feminine Care and Incontinence Care Retail. So, so those types of acquisitions we've already been doing to continue down, that path.
Interesting. Well, that's all the questions that we have time for today, and I will now hand over to Magnus for final remarks.
So thank you so very much for listening in to our innovation webcast. I hope you enjoyed it, and I hope it's been crystal clear how important innovation R&D is to the future success of Essity and how we are investing and also committed to this journey going forward in order to reach our long-term vision and our financial targets. So thank you for listening.
Yes, and thank you also for joining. Any follow-up questions, please reach out to me. Have a very nice evening and take care. Bye from Stockholm.