Focus areas, brand and innovations

Our focus areas

• We set ourselves goals along the value chain for our focus areas

Sustainability is key to the company’s long-term success and as such, is embedded into our corporate strategy. We have systematically formulated expectations for our conduct and defined focus areas to meet the growing challenges along the value chain:

• We source responsibly
• We produce safely for people and the environment
• We produce efficiently
• We value people and treat them with respect
• We drive sustainable products and solutions

The BASF brand

• Above-average awareness of, and trust in, BASF brand in chemical industry
• Corporate design updated

BASF’s success as an integrated global chemical company relies on having a strong brand. This is derived from our strategy and our corporate purpose – “We create chemistry for a sustainable future” – as well as our strategic principles and values.

“Connected” describes the essence of the BASF brand. Connectedness is one of BASF’s great strengths. Our Verbund concept – realized in production, technologies, knowledge, employees, customers and partners – enables innovative solutions for a sustainable future. The claim that “We create chemistry,” as stated in the BASF logo, helps us embed this solution-oriented strategy in the public perception. Our brand creates value by helping communicate its benefits for our stakeholders as well as our values.

Wherever our stakeholders encounter our brand, we want to convince them that BASF stands for connectedness, intelligent solutions, value-adding partnerships, an attractive working environment and sustainability. This contributes to our customers’ confidence in their buying decisions and to our company value.

We are constantly developing our brand image. We regularly measure awareness of and trust in our brand, and therefore in our company. A global market research study conducted every two years showed in 2016 that, in terms of awareness and trust, BASF is above the industry average in numerous countries. Our goal is to continue increasing awareness of BASF in all of our relevant markets. In 2017, we updated our corporate design to be able to present our brand flexibly, uniformly and efficiently in a fast-moving media landscape.

Innovations for a sustainable future

Innovations in chemistry are indispensable to meeting the needs of the growing world population on a long-term basis. The development of innovative products and solutions is, therefore, of vital significance for BASF. In the long term, we aim to continue to significantly increase sales and earnings with new and improved products. Effective and efficient research lays the foundation for this. We believe that the digitalization of research offers great potential and are driving this forward around the world.

We are engaged in intensive research and development activities in our established business areas. One focus of our research is on the enhancement and innovative application of specific key technologies. They pool the diverse competencies of our international Research and Development Verbund to strengthen our competitive ability in the long-term. In addition, we are addressing clearly defined topics to drive forward innovation in new business fields and with new technologies above and beyond the current focus areas of our divisions. We are also working on overarching projects with a high technological, social or regulatory relevance. With our research, we aim to make a decisive contribution to innovative solutions for global challenges and contribute to sustainable development.

Our three global technology platforms are based in our key regions – Europe, Asia Pacific and North America: Process Research & Chemical Engineering (Ludwigshafen, Germany), Advanced Materials & Systems Research (Shanghai, China) and Bioscience Research (Research Triangle Park, North Carolina). We want to continue expanding our research and development activities on a global level. The stronger presence of our research and development in key markets opens up new opportunities to find appropriate solutions for regional markets, actively participate in worldwide innovation processes and gain access to talent.