Evonik expands R&D centre in Shanghai
New investment of €18m with a footprint of more than 10,000 sqm
Evonik plans to expand its R&D centre in Shanghai Xinzhuang with an investment of €18m. The expansion includes the construction of a four-storey R&D building with footprint of more than 10,000 sqm. The new building is scheduled to be inaugurated in mid 2013.
“This is the third expansion of our R&D centre in Shanghai since its opening in 2004. The rapidly increasing demand for R&D facilities in Shanghai reflects our strong focus on ‘innovation in China for China’, which is one of our key success factors for our growth in Asia, especially in the Greater China region,” said Dr Dahai Yu, member of the executive board of Evonik Industries.
As a global leader in specialty chemicals, Evonik focuses on innovation and proximity to customers in the Greater China region as elsewhere. Alongside applications technology laboratories at several sites, the R&D centre in Shanghai-Xinzhuang plays a key role in Evonik’s R&D strategy. “We continue to enhance the local R&D capacity and are expanding our activities from technical service to product development,” said Dr Hans-Josef Ritzert, president Evonik Greater China region.
After the expansion, the R&D Centre has a total of 35,000 sqm of space, housing state-of-the-art laboratories for R&D, application technology and technical service, with aims to develop product applications and provide technology service for customers throughout Greater China and Asia.
In addition, a wide variety of Evonik products are applied in the new R&D building, ranging from external wall, balustrade, lab flooring to interior decoration. The approach is to make the new R&D building a real-life showroom for our customers and visitors, using the Evonik products and solutions. What’s more, the new R&D building will also be the first LEED (Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design) certified building for Evonik worldwide. LEED is a concept of design and construction of building that meet specified standards, resolving much of the negative impact of buildings on their occupants, as well as the environment.
Evonik Industries sees research, development and innovation as pivotal to the company’s business growth. Therefore we endeavour to strengthen our R&D efforts in the Greater China region by boosting local innovation through developing and establishing the R&D collaborations with Chinese research institutions and making use of Chinese scientific research strength for our new products, applications or process development. For example, the company holds the Evonik Meets Science workshop every year, while experts in chemicals are invited to share their latest research developments in one specific area with Evonik's R&D experts.
In China, Evonik has also set up a network of scientific leaders, ie Evonik scientific advisory board for the knowledge sharing and cooperation between Evonik and the leading Chinese chemical scientists. Moreover, Evonik is also planning to carry out fundamental research in China for the best development of local intelligence.
