ICI bigs up its R&D in China

By the end of next year, ICI, the chemicals company that makes everything from paint to food flavours and fragrances, taking in materials for electronics manufacture on the way, will have a shiny new R&D centre with a staff of about 70. The ICI China Technology Centre (CTC) is going up on an existing ICI site at Songjiang – think of an industrial estate near Slough but with none of the glamour and holes in the roads – near Shanghai.

 

The press release revealing the development, quotes the company's CEO, John McAdam, with a sound bite of the usual impenetrable business speak: "This investment is fully in line with our strategy and underlines the commitment to grow our business aggressively in the region, with innovation a key driver of profitable growth - a key differentiator for ICI in meeting the needs of our customers in Asia Pacific." Go on, count the clichés.

 

More interestingly, it seems to be a rare move towards a corporate lab, something that companies enthusiastically demolished in the 1980s. "The CTC will be a single facility to serve ICI's corporate technology needs," says McAdam "as well as those of a number of its business units - Adhesives (part of National Starch and Chemical Company), and ICI Paints decorative and packaging coatings. An additional part of the facility will be shared laboratories. It will be an important research hub within ICI's global R&D network and support all ICI businesses, and will lead links with and collaborative work with universities in China."

 

Looking at those products – paints, fragrances, food flavours and materials for electronics, including adhesives and stuff for monitors and to protect iPods and the like when you drop them – you can see why China appeals to ICI. The population is a big market for the first three, and makes much of the last for the rest of the planet.

 

Another quote from McAdam hints at another issue for European businesses setting up in China. How do you recruit and retain bright young technical people? "ICI intends to become a 'most attractive employer' and the CTC will not only benefit ICI, its businesses and its customers, but also provide better career opportunities for potential employees in the region," he says.