The hub, part-funded by the Australian Research Council, will also analyse market levers and inform innovation on ingredient use, consumer experience, product design and packaging to advance Australia’s positioning as a premium supplier—seen as priority areas for developing markets.
Backers of the A$10m collaboration hope the facility will provide the country with a sustained competitive advantage while assisting the creation of more productive supply chains across the food industry.
The “Unlocking the Food Value Chain” hub draws on research expertise from five of the university’s schools and faculties, while Mondelēz is contributing its research and marketing experience in Southeast Asia.
Mondelēz and Melbourne University say they have committed to share research with small and medium-sized enterprises through an open innovation model to provide market intelligence, including data sourced by a proprietary intellectual property searching technique that analyses consumer-identified attributes of premium food products.
This, they say, will allow businesses to understand food innovation trends and opportunities in China, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Korea, Japan and India.
The hub has also refined qualitative multivariate analysis, a method of comparing the marketability of new and existing products in the Asean markets.
Frank Dunshea, director of the hub, said the collaboration had been driven by the needs of the wider food industry.
“Businesses exporting to Southeast Asia need to understand their market and how they can deliver the best possible product at competitive prices. This hub provides services which will enable Australian businesses to do so.
“The Unlocking the Food Value Chain hub is working to help Australian businesses create products which have instant appeal for local consumers in Southeast Asian nations with technologically advanced processing and packaging.”