How Unilever Is Transforming Product Development With AI
Unilever has developed a new cleaning product with the help of AI.
Unilever and Arzeda have partnered to develop new stain-fighting enzymes for cleaning and laundry products that are designed to reduce the number of ingredients needed to strengthen cleaning performance by nearly 50%. The development happened within an accelerated pace of 18 months – five times faster than estimated, Unilever reports.
This multi-year partnership is thanks to Arzeda’s Intelligent Protein Design Technology which combines artificial design and physics-based design to develop new enzymes and proteins that consume less water and energy, remove stains, and replace petrochemical-derived ingredients.
“The progress made in just 18 months with Arzeda’s technology shows how the convergence of AI and biology is a game-changer for an industry like home care,” said says Peter ter Kulve, president of Unilever Home Care.
To support its Clean Future strategy, Unilever began its partnership with Arzeda in July 2021, with the partner leading the new enzymes' development, engineering, and scale-up. The enzymes are naturally derived and low carbon, helping the company develop products with similar or increased performance while being environmentally sustainable for years to come.
Real-world testing has been completed, and the enzymes are ready to be used within the Unilever portfolio of cleaning products. Unilever has a sustainability goal to reach net zero emissions on all products by 2039.
Unilever previously integrated AI technology as part of product innovation efforts at the company’s Materials Innovation Factory (MIF) in Liverpool, with robots working collaboratively with 250 R&D experts to automate the development of science-backed products. Unilever reports that the factory has the highest concentration of robots doing material chemistry globally, and the technology is responsible for analyzing data and maintaining consistent standards amongst all testing and samples.
AI technology was also used in developing its Hourglass Confession Red Zero lipstick, helping to differentiate amongst various color combinations to help select the final pigments. This process previously required millions of physical experiments.
