Research and Development Director

Job Description

• Driving R&D strategic product initiatives, innovation, renovation, and productivity for the Marina food and beverage creations business.
• Lead R&D projects from concept to launch.
• Partnering with marketing to deliver brand pipelines, innovation, and renovation according to business goals and strategies.
• Executing and delivering the innovation agenda for food and beverage creations.
• Continuous improvement in effective ways of working with the pilot plant to increase productivity and efficiency, to unlock potential for all businesses.
• Leading the selection of key new vendors with procurement and maintaining strong relationships with incumbents to continuously identify and deliver on innovative ideas and expanded capabilities.
• Collaborating closely with all relevant stakeholders to support operational excellence in scaling product launches across both internal and external manufacturing facilities.
• Catalyzing the development of new products, processes, and technologies.
• Explore new process and ingredient technology solutions to deliver differentiated products with relevant consumer benefits and to maintain superiority.
• Comply with all Marina management systems and all other company policies and procedures.

Requirements:

• At least a Master’s degree in Food Science is preferred.
• 10 to 15 years of experience in product design/development (preferably in the food or beverage industry). The ideal candidate will have progressive and increasing levels of responsibility and leadership accountability with at least 10 years of managing product programs and people.
• Demonstrated leadership in cross-functional teams involving marketing, sales, purchasing, and manufacturing in the development of new products.
• Technical depth and relevant experience in food sciences, technology, and processing.
• Able to fully understand a complex and unstable business environment to activate a proper strategy to drive business results from a top and bottom line perspective.
• General knowledge of the processes within marketing, industrial design, supply chain, and sales channels.
• Strong commercial acumen, technical development skills, judgment, and understanding of the business and industry.
• Ability to create a roadmap for short-term and long-term technical deliverables and skills to influence relevant cross-functional business partners for implementation.
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills.
• Excellent business skills and understanding of the levers of R&D.
• Self-starter, autonomous, and demonstrated ability to bring innovative ideas.