on Tuesday inaugurated a new Unilever Fragrance Hub (UFH) at the IIT Bombay campus in , making India the third country after the UK and the United States to host such a facility under Unilever’s global fragrance innovation programme.
The hub is part of Unilever’s broader €100 million investment to build in-house, digitally enabled fragrance creation capabilities worldwide.
The Mumbai facility combines proprietary creation software, real-time evaluation data capture, and advanced compounding technologies, enabling end-to-end fragrance design, testing, and refinement.
The co-location at IIT Bombay is intended to foster academic collaboration, particularly in science, technology, and data-driven fragrance innovation.
Company executives said the facility would allow faster local response to consumer preferences and improve self-reliance in fragrance application and evaluation for categories including shampoos, body washes, deodorants, and laundry detergents.
Vivek Sirohi, Head of the Unilever Fragrance House, said India is a critical engine of innovation for the company’s global business and that the hub would enable fragrances designed from local consumer insights to scale globally.
HUL’s stock was trading at ₹2,073.60 on the NSE on Tuesday, down 0.51 per cent from its previous close of ₹2,084.30, with a total market capitalisation of approximately ₹4.87 lakh crore.
The stock has underperformed the broader over most timeframes, declining around 12.5 per cent over the past year against the index’s 5.76 per cent fall, and has shed over 23 per cent in three years while the Nifty 50 gained roughly 25 per cent in the same period.
HUL, India’s largest by revenue, has positioned the new hub as part of its premiumisation strategy, with fragrance cited as an increasingly important driver of brand preference and product desirability across its portfolio.