Trio of new appointments bolsters food industry centre technical expertise
A trio of new appointments at Cardiff Metropolitan University’s Zero2five Food lndustry Centre will boost the organisation’s technical capacity.
Lee Pugh, Lucy Llewellyn and Sergio Ardu all bring different areas of technical expertise to Zero2five, which delivers Project Helix, a Welsh Government and EU-funded strategic initiative that provides eligible Welsh food and drink companies with a range of support.
Pugh has over 40 years’ baking industry experience in new product development (NPD) and technical sales for organisations across the UK and worldwide. In his new role as head of baking, he will support bakery companies with NPD and also lead the development of industry opportunities for Cardiff Metropolitan University’s food science and technology students.
Lee Pugh, head of baking, said: “I’m looking forward to forging new and strengthening existing relationships between Zero2five and ingredient suppliers, equipment manufacturers and bakery companies across Wales and beyond to help them develop innovative new products which add value to high quality Welsh primary produce and solve industry challenges such as food waste reduction.”
Lucy Llewellyn joins Zero2five’s new product development team from industry where she spent over eight years, most recently as Marks & Spencer development manager. As part of Zero2five’s NPD team, she will support food and drink companies from concept to launch with recipe development, ingredient sourcing, sensory analysis, shelf life optimisation and legal-labelling.
Llewellyn said: “I’m looking forward to working with both small and large food and drink companies across a range of categories. Having worked with some of the largest retailers, I can help client companies develop new products which satisfy supermarket buyer demands.”
Finally, Sergio Ardu joins Zero2five’s technical team with over fifteen years’ technical manager experience in areas such as third-party accreditation (including BRCGS and SALSA), internal auditing, HACCP, microbiology, health and safety, and food safety and security.
Professor David Lloyd, director at ZERO2FIVE Food Industry Centre said: “Our mission is to provide food and drink companies with the support they need to be more competitive in an increasingly challenging marketplace. With these new appointments we can increase our capacity to do that.”