Application Lead - Savory (Food Ingredients R&D) - #46740

Date: 8 May 2026

Country: Singapore

Location:

Biopolis, SG

Function: Innovation, Quality & Food Safety

About Us

As a leading provider of high-quality food and beverage ingredients, we work with farming communities across the globe to grow, source and produce ingredients that are good for consumers, farmers, and the world around us. We supply household food brands and manufacturers worldwide with cocoa, coffee, dairy, nuts and spices ingredients which are often grown on our own farms and estates and sourced from hundreds of thousands of farmers across ~50 countries. Along with our diverse manufacturing and innovation capabilities, this means we can provide ingredients for a range of products, from a plant-based latte mix to an almond based snack bar or a dairy-free ice cream.  Making a positive impact on people and planet is a core component of our Purpose, to be the change for good food and a healthy future. With a deep-rooted presence in the countries where our ingredients are grown, we are closer to farmers, enabling better quality, and more reliable, traceable, and transparent supply. And whoever we’re with, whatever we’re doing, we always make it real.

Food & Beverage Solutions

We have launched a new platform called Food and Beverage solutions, part of our ingredients and solutions reporting unit. This platform consolidates our current category solutions capabilities and innovation infrastructure. We support customers in developing new consumer concepts and application solutions at our four customer solution centers in Amsterdam, Bangalore, Chicago, and Singapore. Food and Beverage solutions leverages the strengths of our five product platforms, including their global and sustainable supply chain capabilities, a complementary portfolio of high-quality food and ingredients, and extensive ingredient expertise. This enables us to address a diverse range of customer requirements in the rapidly evolving Food and Beverage industry. Built on deep consumer, category, and application understanding, we are enhancing our application and R&D capabilities to provide an end-to-end integrated customer experience. This opens up more on-trend and inspired product ideation opportunities. Together, we can co-create product innovations that delight consumers and make your ambitions a reality.

Job Description

Job Title: Application Lead – Savoury

Location: Singapore

Function: Innovation

Reporting manager: Customer Solutions Centre (CSC) Head Singapore/APAC

Position Overview

The Savoury Lead is responsible for defining and driving the Savoury & Culinary application strategy within CSC Singapore, overseeing end-to-end product development, customer solutioning, and technical capability building. This role extends beyond execution to provide technical leadership across all savoury dry, wet, and emulsified systems, ensuring scalable, high-impact solutions across QSR, Foodservice, and B2B segments.

Key Responsibilities

• Product Development & Technical Leadership
  
  

Define formulation strategies across categories and applications

Ensure integration of ingredient functionality (e.g. flavours, extracts, hydrocolloids, starches) into robust formulations

Guide development of multi-functional systems adaptable across applications

Drive standardization and development of base formulations and modular systems

Drives translation of concepts across formats (e.g. snack seasoning to meat systems, wet to dry platforms)

• Sensory & Reverse Engineering Excellence
  
  

Establish structured sensory frameworks and evaluation protocols

Lead product benchmarking and reverse engineering into scalable formats

Translate sensory gaps into formulation strategies and system improvements

Build sensory guidance across team to ensure consistent product delivery

• Customer Solutioning & Business Impact
  
  

Lead technical engagement with key customers across QSR, Foodservice, and B2B

Translate customer briefs, issues, and challenges into innovation opportunities

Drive co-creation sessions, prototypes, and demonstrations

Partner with commercial teams to support customer conversion and growth

• Team Leadership & Capability Building
  
  

Manage and develop a team of 2–3 Solution Specialists

Provide technical mentorship and coaching on product design and scale-up

Ensure adherence to development SOPs, documentation, and best practices

Align and guide senior specialists and category managers under broader savoury agenda

• Scale-Up & Manufacturing Integration
  
  

Oversee translation from lab to pilot and plant scale

Ensure formulations meet processing, cost, and manufacturability requirements

Guide troubleshooting of scale-up challenges across internal and external manufacturing

Drive alignment between R&D, Quality, Regulatory, Operations, and supply teams

• Ingredient & System Strategy
  
  

Define and optimize ingredient selection for performance and scalability

Develop platform systems for reuse across multiple applications

Evaluate supplier capabilities and ingredient alternatives

Drive standardization of blends and systems for efficiency

• Innovation & Knowledge Management
  
  

Lead development of application knowledge and formulation databases

Capture learnings from projects to accelerate future development

Identify trends and translate into innovation pipeline

Support regional projects and cross-market initiatives

• Quality, Compliance & Governance
  
  

Ensure all developments meet regulatory, food safety, and customer requirements

Maintain documentation of formulations, specifications, and test results

Ensure compliance with internal SOPs and development processes

Requirements

Experience & Qualifications

Minimum Degree in Food Science, Food Technology or related field

15+ years experience in savoury and culinary product development

Strong experience in culinary premixes, solutions, sauces, marinades, seasonings, etc.

Experience across QSR, Foodservice, and B2B applications

Proven leadership of technical teams

Technical Skills

Deep understanding of ingredient functionality across systems

Expertise in powders, emulsions, and liquid applications

Strong capability in reverse engineering and sensory-led development

Experience in scale-up and commercialization

Leadership & Functional Skills

Strong leadership and stakeholder management capability

Ability to operate in fast-paced, multi-project environments

Strong customer-facing and communication skills

Ability to translate technical outcomes into business value

Other Requirements

Willingness to travel (20–25%)

Able to adapt to fast paced working environment and new systems

Reliable, proactive, and highly initiative

ofi is an equal opportunity employer and values diversity. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to racial or ethnic origin, color, age, religion or belief, sex, nationality, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, genetic information, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law.

Applicants are requested to complete all required steps in the application process including providing a resume/CV in order to be considered for open roles.