L'Oréal invested €1.3 billion in research during 2025. Three percent of the company's turnover is reinvested into research. L'Oréal placed sixth on Fortune's 2026 list of Europe's Most Innovative Companies.

Delphine Viguier-Hovasse, chief innovation and prospective officer at L'Oréal, stated the company's primary metric is market share. "We have one KPI at L'Oréal," she said, "gaining market share with new products." She noted the competitive landscape: "You have AI inventing images and brand names, vendors providing formulas and molecules at a very fast pace—but you also have a lot of brands dying." Regarding the role of technology for established firms, she added, "AI is fantastic for old companies." The company has registered 725 patents.

Viguier-Hovasse explained that AI accelerates formula development. "With AI, you can test a molecule in three months, so the cost of a mistake is considerably smaller now," she said. Last year, the company conducted extensive testing. "Last year, we ran 40,000 stability tests on our formulas," Viguier-Hovasse said. "We've done 44,000 tests on people's reaction to one skin cream." L'Oréal's scientists maintain a database containing information on skin color, hair reactions to environments, and wrinkle patterns. "We have accumulated a lot of data, not necessarily over the past 120 years, but over the past 40 years," she said. "We need AI to be able to read it and sort through it." The role of innovation officer at L'Oréal was elevated to the executive committee.

The company is developing longevity treatments at Episkin, its Lyon-based innovation center. Viguier-Hovasse highlighted the advantage of the company's scale in trend detection. "One of our strengths over the local or independent companies is that we are global—you might have a weak signal coming out of the U.S. but our teams notice the same in China and in Korea and it starts mushrooming," she said.