By Casey Neill
“I thank you for bringing colour to our lives.”
And with that, Industry and Employment Minister Wade Noonan officially opened Ampacet Australia’s new multimillion dollar headquarters in Dandenong South on Friday 14 July.
“Thank you on behalf of the state of Victoria,” he said.
Mr Noonan said Ampacet’s investment gave other people confidence to invest.
“You are very much leading the way,” he said.
He said the success stories he heard from businesses were about innovation and people.
“You can’t afford to stand still,” he said.
Ampacet Australia formed in August 2014, first acquiring Allied Colour and adding Oceania Plastics in 2015.
It’s part of US-based Ampacet Corporation, which since 1937 has provided colouring to the plastics industry for use in food packaging and other products.
It has 24 manufacturing plants around the world that employ 2000 people.
The new Rodeo Drive facility has a laboratory for product development and quality assurance, including about $1 million of machinery dedicated to quality testing.
The company will collaborate with its customers from the idea generation stage through to product development and commercialisation.
Ampacet Australia also plans to start exporting flame-retardant products to China to use in manufacturing construction products.
Ampacet president and CEO Yves Carette praised the Australian team for succeeding even before the new facilities opened.
“Thanks to your hard work, sales in Australia have more than doubled over the last three years,” he said.
