Nestle Opens Global R&D Center
Nestle opens a global R&D Center for biscuits and cereal-based snacks in Santiago de Chile. Present at the inauguration were Álvaro Erazo, Health Minister, Reinaldo Ruiz, Agriculture Minister, Alberto Undurraga, Mayor of Maipú and Paul Bulcke, Nestle CEO.
The new R&D Center will lead Nestle's global research and development in biscuits and cereal-based snacks, focusing both on innovation and renovation of products. R&D Santiago will bring together specialists from various fields, including nutrition, engineering, product development and quality control. The development of new technologies at R&D Santiago will help to further reduce sugar and fat levels to make biscuits lighter, without compromising taste or texture. R&D Santiago will also develop biscuits with bioactive ingredients to improve digestive health as well as fortified products to address local micronutrient deficiencies, thereby adapting biscuits to local tastes and needs.
"The research at this Center will provide exciting opportunities for innovation in a very important product category. It will allow us to offer consumers in Latin America and beyond the choice of tasty, healthy, more nutritious biscuits," says Nestle's CEO Paul Bulcke at the event. Nestle's growing and profitable biscuit business amounted to CHF 1.4 billion in 2008, with 60 percent of sales achieved in Latin America. Overall, Latin America is an important region for Nestle, where the company has been present for many decades and reached sales of CHF 15.5 billion in 2008. In Chile, Nestle has been present for 76 years, and today has seven production facilities in different parts of the country. The new center in Santiago will benefit from synergies between R&D and biscuit manufacturing by being based at Nestle's industrial site in Maipu, which employs over 1,200 people.
The new R&D Center will lead Nestle's global research and development in biscuits and cereal-based snacks, focusing both on innovation and renovation of products. R&D Santiago will bring together specialists from various fields, including nutrition, engineering, product development and quality control. The development of new technologies at R&D Santiago will help to further reduce sugar and fat levels to make biscuits lighter, without compromising taste or texture. R&D Santiago will also develop biscuits with bioactive ingredients to improve digestive health as well as fortified products to address local micronutrient deficiencies, thereby adapting biscuits to local tastes and needs.
"The research at this Center will provide exciting opportunities for innovation in a very important product category. It will allow us to offer consumers in Latin America and beyond the choice of tasty, healthy, more nutritious biscuits," says Nestle's CEO Paul Bulcke at the event. Nestle's growing and profitable biscuit business amounted to CHF 1.4 billion in 2008, with 60 percent of sales achieved in Latin America. Overall, Latin America is an important region for Nestle, where the company has been present for many decades and reached sales of CHF 15.5 billion in 2008. In Chile, Nestle has been present for 76 years, and today has seven production facilities in different parts of the country. The new center in Santiago will benefit from synergies between R&D and biscuit manufacturing by being based at Nestle's industrial site in Maipu, which employs over 1,200 people.