Key takeaways:
Fragrance ingredient development has historically been an internal, closed process that is often slow and expensive. Spending millions of dollars without guaranteed success is a risky business move for brands, leaving new ingredient introductions largely stagnant for decades.
Osmo, the olfactory technology company, is attempting to change that by auctioning its fragrance captives and offering exclusive, perpetual licenses to 10 proprietary AI-developed fragrance ingredients.
So how will this work?
Buyers interested in specific captives can evaluate them, receive samples, and complete a 12-week diligence period before officially submitting binding bids. From fragrance houses to CPG companies, any buyer with in-house perfumery capabilities, as well as chemical manufacturers, is eligible to bid.
The auction will debut at the World Perfumery Congress in Monterey, California, on June 23, where industry players will have the chance to secure these ingredients through an open, competitive process.
“When the industry has better ingredients, everyone benefits,” said Mike Rytokoski, Senior Vice President at Osmo, in a press release. “Our initial goal was to create amazing novel molecules for our own use, but we realized that it’s better to get these materials into the hands of larger companies that can bring them to consumers at scale. This auction is how we will achieve this.”
The company develops ingredient molecules through its Olfactory Intelligence platform, which screens billions of potential molecules by predicting how they will smell, their intensity and performance, and their safety. This is done before a molecule is even created, unlike the trial-and-error process used in experimental labs.
According to Osmo, the platform enabled the company to create 43 molecules over three years thanks to its high success rate and cost efficiency. As a result, the company was able to file more fragrance ingredient patents than the rest of the industry combined.
“These molecules exist because AI can do in months what traditional discovery takes years to achieve,” said Alex Wiltschko, CEO and founder of Osmo, in the release. “Now we’re opening access to them in a way the industry has never seen before.”