Netherlands-based CSM NV’s Corbion America Inc. broke ground June 21 on a new, 58,000 square-foot complex incorporating expanded regional headquarters and state-of-the-art lab facilities. The new facility is located in Lenexa, Kan., just down the street from the company’s current—but outgrown— campus. On hand was Corbion CEO, Tjerk de Ruiter, who noted the new complex will “help fuel the company’s continued growth as a global supplier of ingredient solutions to the world’s foremost food manufacturers.” Expected completion date is August, 2018.
The upgrade is designed to enhance Corbion’s already strong research, development and application capabilities and support the company’s collaborative approach to useful innovation. Corbion scientists, marketers, and application experts will be better able to work closely with customers in the development of product concepts and respond to consumer needs and demands, keeping pace in a constantly evolving global marketplace.
Corbion, with more than $1 billion in annual sales and employing more than 1,600, is building the new facilities with sustainability as a top priority. It will reduce the company’s local energy footprint by 50%, via solar panels, LED and automated lighting systems, air/HVAC system optimizations, and window/glass/insulation improvements. The office will use furniture made with recycled and/or green material and expand current recycling and compostable waste-management. Incorporated into the new facilities are cutting-edge bakery research and application labs, as well as a new meat lab to support Corbion’s rapidly growing role in the meat industry.
“Corbion’s tagline is ‘Keep Creating’ because we never stop looking for new and better ways to apply our technologies and experience to benefit our customers and the consumers who buy their products,” noted Andy Muller, executive vice president of Corbion, and a skilled hand with the shovel at the summer groundbreaking. “Each of us is a consumer, too, and we want that perspective to help shape everything we do. Combining that view with our technical expertise and our customers’ knowledge, we work side by side with them to create something better. It’s what we’re known for; it’s what we’re so good at. Our new facilities will support us in doing it even more.”
Corbion, already a market leader in lactic acid and lactic acid derivatives, will continue to expand on its expertise in emulsifiers and functional blends in the baking industry, and expand development of “clean-label” alternatives to traditional, synthetic ingredient solutions for controlling pathogens that can threaten consumers’ health, and spoilage organisms that can threaten manufacturers’ bottom line.
Through this consolidation Corbion will be able to reduce operation costs while benefiting from a new facility. This fact, combined with their continued growth, and desire to continue to work side-by-side with their customers to create affordable food that people love and safely enjoy, necessitates the new construction.
