DuPont Nutrition & Health expands with Japanese innovation center

25 Jul 2018 --- A new DuPont Nutrition & Health innovation center located in Japan will deliver cross-functional solutions with a broad ingredient portfolio to customers Japan and Korea. The center, which will open in Kanagawa Prefecture later this summer, will provide solutions for local customers primarily in the bakery, beverages and dairy industries. The center spans almost 700 square meters, making it the largest in Japan among international ingredient companies, according to DuPont.

“This innovation center is designed to give our customers a deeper involvement in the development process, which will help us deliver the exact solutions they’re pursuing in a much shorter time span,” says Kobus de Klerk, Global Innovation Leader, Nutrition & Health.

“The face-to-face interaction will help us improve relationships with our customers and provide them with the full benefits of DuPont’s cross-functional solutions and our complete range of ingredients.”

The facility will allow customers to work directly with DuPont scientists to develop solutions using our wide product range of customized system blends and dietary supplements so brand owners meet the changing needs of their local markets.

The facility’s design incorporates several features that hope to provide new innovations across many industries:

• The bakery lab features “state-of-the-art” equipment for making various breads and rolls, steamed cakes and doughnuts.
• The dairy area presents the capability to make a range of yogurts, fermented drinks, beverages and ice creams. In the micro-testing lab, stability tests can be conducted on the enumeration of probiotics with prototypes of customers’ products formulated with strains from DuPont Danisco.
• In the dry blend lab, customized system blends can be created with a granulator, compressed tablet machine and revolving pan.

“While this facility gives us incredible innovation potential, the real focus is on our customers and delivering solutions to solve the market challenges they face,” says Nobuaki Tsukagoshi, Japan sales leader, Nutrition & Health. “Japan has the world’s oldest population. This innovation center also would serve as a hub for senior food development that will allow other markets to leverage on our strong innovation capabilities, especially in the senior foods space.”

“In DuPont Nutrition & Health, we believe solutions cannot come from the top down. We work collaboratively with our customers to develop customized solutions for each customer and market that provide the taste and nutrition needs of local cultures. As one of the world’s leading innovator in the food ingredients space, customers count on us to develop new products that offer real value to their consumers. 2019 will be an exciting year for new product introductions from DuPont Nutrition & Health as we have a robust technology pipeline to address market needs and regional health concerns,” de Klerk tells NutritionInsight.

“DuPont has 27 technology and innovation sites around the world, to develop collaborative solutions for local market challenges. We have a strong belief that while science is global, but solutions must be local. They must be developed in partnership with local food companies, local experts and local synergies. We now have 9 sites in Asia, which will help us focus our innovation in dairy, bakery, beverages, dietary supplements and pharmaceutical industries, and re-directing resources toward higher growth products, such as cultures, probiotics and systems,” he adds.

In further news, at this years IFT expo in Chicago, US, the company showcased its latest market-based innovations, including plant-based protein advancements and explained how the future of plant-based proteins for food and beverage applications lies in blends and a broader scope of flavor combinations. DuPont Nutrition & Health also recently announced the development of a strain-level identification assay in probiotic testing, leading the way for industry-wide product integrity and label accuracy, in partnership with Eurofins.

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