13 October 2008 - Unilever's Centre of Excellence dedicated to liquid foods will be operational in December and officially opened during the first quarter of 2009.
Located in Poznan, Poland, the Centre has been gradually adding expertise and research staff over 2008.
“The Centre drives project delivery for all wet foods formulations ranging from soups, sauces, mealmakers, bouillons, ketchup and other tomato based preparations”, says Unilever spokesman Gerbert van Genderen Stort.
Researchers will also focus on packaging solutions with a particular emphasis on flexible materials used in wet processing (retort and aseptic) and cans.
Unilever is a leader in many of Poland’s fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) markets, such as ice-cream with its Algida brand, tea with Lipton and Saga, margarines with Rama and Flora, as well as soup with Knorr.
Unilever began production at its new soup plant in September 2007. Most of the facility’s output production is exported, mainly to France, Netherlands, Belgium, Spain and UK. Moreover, the plant also caters for Germany, Italy, Scandinavia and more recently Hungary.
Unilever Foods R&D employs 2800 R&D professionals around the world, working in 4 Global Research centres, 6 Global Product Development centres, 12 Regional development centres and in country implementation teams in all countries/multi-country organisations that Unilever operates in.
Unilever employs nearly 3,300 people in Poland.