Top award has F&P cooking

Daniel Witten-Hannah. Photos supplied.
Daniel Witten-Hannah. Photos supplied.
World-class work from Fisher & Paykel Appliances designers in Dunedin has won a global award and the winning product, a built-in oven, is one of 70 products being launched today by the company.

The success of the products, and the scale of the design work being done in New Zealand, may mean extra research and development (R&D) staff being employed in Dunedin and Auckland.

F&P product development executive vice-president Dan Witten-Hannah said in an interview the focus was on establishing the company's New Zealand operations as the R&D ''centre of excellence'' for the group worldwide.

F&P is now owned by Chinese company Haier.

''The teams we're assembling now will be critical for achieving our goal for F&P to become the world's leading premium whiteware company.''

Recruitment for around 100 new jobs was progressing successfully, with ''great talent'' being sourced locally, he said.

''Our plans for growth continue to accelerate, which means if we get more good applicants than the initial 100, we'll certainly look at hiring them.''

Mr Witten-Hannah, who lived and worked in Dunedin for several years, said the Dunedin design centre attracted top graduates from Otago and Canterbury universities while the Auckland centre attracted graduates from North Island universities.

Asked if he had trouble finding the type of people the company wanted, he said F&P had hired about 15 graduates a year in recent years but this year it wanted

30. For New Zealand to grow, the Government had to invest more in R&D to attract scientists, designers and engineers and spend less on accountants, lawyers and arts students.

The new gas-on-glass cooktop and front-loader washing machine being launched today by Fisher &...
The new gas-on-glass cooktop and front-loader washing machine being launched today by Fisher & Paykel Appliances.
''We need a few more thousand engineers, because once they start working, things start to happen.''

Otago Chamber of Commerce president Peter McIntyre said the design centre in Dunedin was an offshoot of the former F&P plant at Silverstream, through the retention of the highly-skilled staff.

To that extent, an industry base had been retained in the city. R&D was a large part of the total spending of any international company and any news about increasing the workforce in the city was welcome.

''We are an affordable city in which to do business. We have skilled people coming out of the university and the [Otago] polytechnic, so this has to be positive. It is not only the tertiary institutes providing education, it is about providing sought-after jobs for those graduates."

A nationwide road show starts today to introduce the new products to retailers over the next few months. The bulk of the new products were kitchen appliances. Innovations also feature in refrigeration and laundry lines, Mr Witten-Hannah said.

''World-leading innovation and quality has been what our development team have been focusing on over the past five years and this range is the result. We have developed what we believe is a game-changer in cooking appliances.''

The 60cm oven had up to 30% more capacity inside than competitors' models of that size, he said. Dunedin F&P designers pulled the 60cm standard oven apart and reconstructed it so the new model had 77 litres of usable capacity inside.

The venting technology in the nine and 11-function oven models allowed customers to cook moist roast meats and crisp roast vegetables at the same time.

''The best thing is this oven is no bigger externally than other models on the market, so no kitchen modifications are required to be able to cook more food, with better results.''

The built-in oven, and the new gas on glass cooktop, had already received the prestigious international design award known as the ''Red Dot'' before the products reached the shop floor, Mr Witten-Hannah said.

The awards were the ''Oscars'' of cooking and 40,000 entries were sent to Germany for judging. About half the 70 products being introduced were completely new and the balance featured high-quality upgrades to existing models.

The first front-loading washing machine with SmartDrive technology was part of the launch. Front-loaders in New Zealand typically only had long-cycle washes but the technology used by F&P allowed customers to put larger loads through wash cycles shorter than 60 minutes. They were quieter, too.

dene.mackenzie@odt.co.nz

Add a Comment