A world-leading chemicals firm has boosted its presence in the UK with a new facility delivered by national contractor Kier. Infineum officially opened a new Global Centre of Innovation at its UK headquarters near Didcot.

The 3,500ft² centre delivers the necessary infrastructure to support Infineum’s technology leadership to enable improved innovation. It has also created more than 50 new jobs for talented chemists and engineers and includes new laboratories for research and development, collaborative meeting spaces, office space and a new restaurant.

Representatives from Kier and key Infineum employees were on hand to celebrate the opening of the new facility.

Mark Pausey, managing director at Kier Regional Building Central, said: “We have worked closely and collaboratively with Infineum for the duration of the build. As with all of our projects, we have prioritised safety at every aspect of the build, employing a full-time safety manager and working closely with the clients team of safety professionals.

“We are thrilled to be handing this project over, allowing innovation to thrive and employees to research and develop new products in Infineum’s brand-new high spec laboratories.”

Laura Salamon, project manager at Infineum, added: “We at Infineum are extremely proud of our new global Centre of Innovation, which is a state-of-the-art new building encompassing new laboratories for research and development equipped with the latest technologies, a variety of collaborative meeting spaces with innovative design throughout, offices and a new restaurant for all employees and visitors. We have received universal enthusiastic praise from all our colleagues about the high quality of the finishes and how well the space was designed, meeting all the project deliverables.”