Puratos Announces Innovation Centers on Centennial Anniversary

Puratos turns 100 on February 5, 2020. The bakery, patisserie and chocolate leader has announced that the milestone is celebrated by its 9,500 employees across the 70 countries where the group is present.

To honor its anniversary, Puratos will launch three new innovation centers across three continents in 2020. To continue its international expansion and engagement with emerging markets, Puratos also signed two new joint ventures in Kenya & Ethiopia in January.

Commenting on this important milestone for the group, Puratos CEO Daniel Malcorps said: “Our centenary is an opportunity to reaffirm our commitment to our vision and our values: a robust scientific approach, a constant quest for innovation, with health and well-being as a cornerstone and a deep-rooted belief in the valuable role that food plays in society.”

For a century, Puratos has been committed to innovation. The family company, which started in a Belgian garage with the vision of simplifying the lives of bakers and confectioners, has become one of the world’s leading ingredients manufacturers. From the launch of the first branded bread (Pura-Malté) to the discovery of the now legendary T-500, Puratos has been at the forefront of change.

Today, Puratos invests 2.7% of its annual turnover in R&D and the group employs more than 1,000 scientists in over 70 R&D centers and 90 innovation centers across the globe. Complementing these efforts in 2020 will be the launch of three new innovation centers to be built in Taiwan, Brazil, and Mexico. In Europe, the existing Spanish innovation center will be fully refurbished with state-of-the-art facilities to provide customers with all the tools they need to boost their business.

As early as 1955, Puratos was setting its sights on international expansion when the group began exporting its products to neighboring countries. Global expansion exploded in the 1990s with a number of strategic acquisitions. Today, over 90% of the group’s turnover is generated outside Belgium, of which nearly one third is produced in emerging markets.

This year, Puratos will strengthen its position overseas, specifically on the African continent with the creation of two joint-ventures in Kenya and Ethiopia. This local presence in key countries will enable us to strengthen our relationships with customers, localize production and develop new products and concepts using local raw materials.

An example of Puratos’s commitment to sustainability is its game-changing approach to the responsible sourcing of cocoa. Unlike other cocoa sustainability programs, Puratos Cacao-Trace focuses on quality rather than quantity. Through Cacao-Trace, Puratos helps farmers deliver cocoa beans of superior quality, which in turn earn them extra revenue.

Puratos believes it is important to make an impact in the world that goes beyond economic value and one way that we address this is through the Bakery School Foundation. When the company began operating in India, it was struck by the lack of educational opportunities for underprivileged youngsters.