Who owns Axe?
Axe is owned by Unilever (the United Kingdom, LSE: ULVR).[1]
Evidence: Unilever PLC Annual Report on Form 20-F for 2025, SEC EDGAR, 12 March 2026. Verified from filings; last checked .
Key facts
- Current owner
- Unilever PLC verified
- Owner HQ
- 🇬🇧 United Kingdom, London
- Origin
- 🇫🇷 France
- Founded
- 1983
- Category
- Personal care & beauty › Deodorants, shaving & grooming › Deodorant & antiperspirant
- Parent ticker
- LSE: ULVR NYSE: UL AEX: UNA
- Trademark registrant
- CONOPCO, INC. (USPTO)
- Last verified
- · 2 sources
About Axe
Axe is a men's grooming brand Unilever launched in France in 1983, built around body sprays sold on the promise of attracting attention. It is sold as Lynx in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand, because the Axe trademark was already registered in those markets by other companies. The range now covers deodorant, shower gel and hair styling.
What Unilever's annual report says about Axe
Sentences about Axe from Unilever's latest annual filing[1], copied word for word.
Introduced in the US in 2024 under Dove and Dove Men+Care, this year we scaled the technology across Rexona and Axe, with whole-body deodorants now in 15 markets.
Axe launched new gourmand-inspired variants and limited editions, like Cherry Spritz and Sunset Fresh, featuring notes such as key lime, sage and apple.
How often Unilever names Axe in its annual report
A plain count of the times the name appears in the text of each annual report, not counting the start of a sentence. A brand that an owner writes about more is usually one it treats as central.
Trademark record for Axe
The USPTO record for the Axe mark lists CONOPCO, INC. as the owner of record (serial number 78132985). A trademark is often held by a group company rather than the listed parent, so the registrant's name can differ from the owner named above.[2]
Ownership timeline of Axe
Where Axe sits in Unilever
Controlling ownership as of . Brands grouped under the entity that owns them; large groups are collapsed.
- Axe
- Bango
- Brut
- Cif
- Clear
- Close-Up
- Colman's
- Comfort
- Degree
- Dermalogica
- Domestos
- Dove
- Dove Men+Care
- Grüns (80%)
- Hellmann's
- Horlicks
- Hourglass Cosmetics
- Impulse
- Kate Somerville
- Knorr
- Lifebuoy
- Liquid I.V.
- Living Proof
- Lux
- Lynx
- Maizena
- Marmite
- Murad
- Nexxus
- Nutrafol
- OMO
- Paula's Choice
- Pepsodent
- Persil
- Pond's
- Pot Noodle
- Radox
- Rexona
- Royco
- SheaMoisture
- Signal
- Simple
- St. Ives
- Suave (outside the United States and Canada)
- Sunlight
- Sunsilk
- Sure
- Tatcha
- The Vegetarian Butcher
- TRESemmé
- Vaseline
- VO5
- Zendium
Open the full Unilever ownership tree →
See the full Unilever brand portfolio (53) →
Other brands owned by Unilever
Unilever controls 53 brands on Brandtree, 34 of them in personal care & beauty.
Also in personal care & beauty
- Brut (1964)
- Clear (1974)
- Close-Up (1967)
- Degree (1990)
- Dermalogica (1986)
- Dove (1957)
- Dove Men+Care (2010)
- Hourglass Cosmetics (2004)
- Impulse (1972)
- Kate Somerville (2004)
- Lifebuoy (1894)
- Living Proof (2005)
- Lux (1899)
- Lynx (1985)
- Murad (1989)
- Nexxus (1979)
- Paula's Choice (1995)
- Pepsodent (1915)
Other brands in deodorant & antiperspirant, and who owns them
Unilever has more brands in deodorant & antiperspirant on Brandtree than any other owner: 5 of 14.
| Brand | Owner | Owner based in |
|---|---|---|
| Lume | Mammoth Brands | 🇺🇸 United States |
| Native | Procter & Gamble | 🇺🇸 United States |
| Impact | ACI Limited | 🇧🇩 Bangladesh |
| Speed Stick | Colgate-Palmolive | 🇺🇸 United States |
| Exit | Osotspa | 🇹🇭 Thailand |
| Mitchum | Revlon | 🇺🇸 United States |
| Banho a Banho | Ypê | 🇧🇷 Brazil |
| Mando | Mammoth Brands | 🇺🇸 United States |
About the owner: Unilever
Unilever is a publicly listed company headquartered in London, United Kingdom, founded in 1929. Brandtree records 53 brands under its control, and it is listed as LSE: ULVR, NYSE: UL and AEX: UNA.
Unilever is a British consumer goods company formed in 1929 by the merger of Dutch margarine producer Margarine Unie and British soap maker Lever Brothers. It reports through four business groups: Beauty & Wellbeing, Personal Care, Home Care and Foods. Its ice cream business was demerged as The Magnum Ice Cream Company in December 2025.
🇫🇷 Axe and other French brands
Brandtree records a controlling owner for 322 brands that began in France. 100 of them (31%) are now controlled by a company headquartered in another country, Axe among them.
- A-Derma — Pierre Fabre 🇫🇷
- BIC Razors — BIC 🇫🇷
- Bioderma — NAOS 🇫🇷
- Botot — Bolton Group 🇮🇹
- Chanel No. 5 — Chanel 🇬🇧
- Darphin — Estée Lauder 🇺🇸
Frequently asked questions
Who is the parent company of Axe?
The parent company of Axe is Unilever, a publicly listed company headquartered in the United Kingdom.
Is Axe French or British?
Axe originated in France in 1983, but it is owned today by Unilever, which is headquartered in the United Kingdom. So Axe is a French-origin brand under British ownership.
Is Axe still owned by Unilever?
Yes. As of 8 October 2026, Axe is still owned by Unilever. The ownership record was last checked against primary sources on that date.
Sources (2) & corrections
Last verified . Every ownership fact above is backed by one of these primary documents. Numbers in brackets in the text refer to this list.
- [1] Unilever PLC Annual Report on Form 20-F for 2025 — SEC EDGAR, SEC Form 20-F, published 12 March 2026; retrieved 16 September 2026.
- [2] USPTO: AXE, serial 78132985, registration 3109898 — United States Patent and Trademark Office, Trademark registry; retrieved 26 September 2026.
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