Croda Opens Facility in Africa

Croda has officially opened its new Centre of Excellence for Africa. Located in Parkhaven, Boksburg, east of Johannesburg, the new center is the latest example of Croda’s commitment to innovation, coupling efficacy testing and applications expertise to support customer’s innovation needs.
 
Company executives, esteemed local dignitaries, industry organisation representatives, valued customers and employees were on hand to mark the official opening.
 
South Africa was an obvious candidate for Croda to invest further in. Anticipated rising disposable incomes and the demand for more sophisticated and solution-oriented products are expected to support continued growth. Nowadays, a beauty product will be expected to prove its efficacy beyond its label claim. As such, local manufacturers are now more aware of the need to conduct product efficacy testing to substantiate the claims attached to their product offerings.
 
Croda South Africa’s new Centre of Excellence has both an Efficacy Laboratory and a Formulation Laboratory to help customers meet these requirements. The Personal Care technical team in Parkhaven will be supporting product claims for both the Skin and Hair Care markets.  These studies will involve local consumers in panel testing so that the data generated is highly relevant and valuable to local customers and brands.
 
The Croda South Africa Efficacy Laboratory consists of a Hair Salon and a temperature controlled skin and hair testing laboratory.
 
The Hair Salon facility is designed to test hair product efficacy on global hair types but will focus predominantly on black ethnic hair. The team will look to support the hair care formulator to select ingredients that can meet challenging briefs from mild relaxer solutions to scalp wellness deep treatments. All hair studies are conducted by a trained hair stylist with the lead of the application Scientist.
 
For Skin Care, the local team has expertise in both formulation and claims substantiation. Testing protocols are conducted using state of the art equipment to generate consumer-appealing claims such as moisturization, oil control, skin barrier function repair, shine reduction, radiance, elasticity, skin lightening and firming. To visualize the benefits to customers, the Centre of Excellence is equipped with skin imaging software that is used to evaluate the condition of the skin. All testing is completed in the humidity and temperature controlled room.

Croda South Africa joins Croda’s list of other laboratories offering formulation and efficacy support in UK, USA, France, Singapore and Mexico.