Product Development Specialist - Technical Innovation Platform Food Contact & Primary Packaging in Redditch

The role will be responsible for being the technical expert in the design phase of projects for innovation products implementation, making sure all technical fine-tuning is done to meet customer requirements & enable successful implementation. You will drive the design part of product implementation for scaling up the product roll-out beyond the initial pilots, complementary to the other roles in the implementation team. Acting as a technical expert in the interaction with customers & external partners, you will be deploying appropriate methodologies and tools, engaging with the sub-regional D&I Network, production hubs and local Design & Innovation stakeholders.

Responsibilities

• Deploy newly developed packaging products to fully commercialized products that support customer needs, required functionality, manufacturing feasibility and regulatory compliance by examining challenges and desired outcomes
• Drive the design customisation work to finetune the products to specific customer needs & requirements
• Work in close collaboration with the selected site(s) to generate required specifications and drawings ready for production
• Create 2D and 3D design structures, manufacture ready files & specifications fit for implementation and further scale up
• Set and own the product requirements, matching customer specs and performance requirements
• Drive, coordinate and when applicable conduct/participate in performance testing (e.g. transit, shelf‑life, drop tests) and refine designs based on test results against desired outcome
• Evaluate manufacturability, material compatibility and packaging line requirements to ensure designs are implementable and robust
• Design, organise & coordinate prototypes and sample creation required for customer validation stages
• Work with manufacturing, partners, co‑packers and external suppliers during the scale-up and commercialization phase to ensure packaging integrity and production performance

Qualifications

• Degree in industrial/Product design or packaging engineering
• Proven experience packaging design for implementation on customer packing lines, including prototyping, validation and production integration
• Hands on problem solving technical design thinking – talented and skilled to design with a high level of eye for detail, resulting in implementable innovative structural designs while balancing aesthetics, functionality, manufacturing and sustainability requirements
• Strong knowledge of packaging materials, products, manufacturing processes & packaging mechanisation/automation
• Skilled in CAD software (preferably ArtiosCAD) to develop detailed packaging designs
• Demonstrated capabilities of troubleshooting issues, making real‑world design decisions under time and cost constraints
• Ability to manage multiple projects across different development stages
• Result focused and passionate about design.