Editor's note:
From December 29, 2023 to January 1, 2024, the 11th China (Daojiao) Food Culture Festival and the 2023 Dongguan Food Industry Transformation and Upgrading Achievement Exhibition will be held at Jichuan Stadium and Jichuan Square in Daojiao Town. As Dongguan has incorporated the food industry into the city's strategic pillar industry set cultivation and construction system, the industrial division of labor has become increasingly refined, the industrial supporting advantages are obvious, and a diversified development trend has been formed. From now on, Nanfang + client will set up a special column of "Dongguan Flavor Intelligent Manufacturing", focusing on excavating and reporting a number of representative enterprises in Dongguan's food industry from a micro perspective and unique observation, and comprehensively showing the latest practices and innovative highlights of Dongguan's food industry.
Nowadays, in shopping malls and supermarkets around the country, there are a variety of low-sugar, oil-free, steamed healthy biscuits, which have become the favorite snacks for many people. What many people may not know is that domestic health biscuits were first created in a long-established food company in Dongguan - Dongguan Silang Food*** hereinafter referred to as "Dongguan Silang").
For more than 30 years since its establishment and development, Dongguan Silang has always adhered to the "healthy and delicious + food efficacy" for independent research and development and production, not only launching the popular brands of Silang, Langkezi, A-taste, Qiaomanwaist and other brands of casual biscuits, beverages, jelly, tablet sugar and other health food products with the concept of "great health", which has the eight health effects of hangover and liver protection, immune enhancement, beauty and beauty, weight management, sugar and pressure control, sleep aid, stress reduction, and lung clearing. Delicious and healthy".
N innovations in a piece of biscuit: leading the health food industry.
Biscuits, drinks, tablet candies, moon cakes...Walking into the product exhibition hall of Dongguan Silang, a dazzling array of food products with different functions and tastes are neatly arranged, as if entering the food area of the shopping mall, and the word "health" in the exhibition hall is particularly attention-grabbing.
Taking advantage of the reform and opening up, in the late 80s and early 90s of the 20th century, the founder of Dongguan Silang came to Dongguan from Hong Kong to start a business, and entered the food industry with instant noodles as the entry point.
After 1995, Dongguan Silang Xi learned from foreign advanced food concepts, and successively launched pizza series products and individually packaged biscuits, which quickly opened up the mainland market, and the first product led the trend of the biscuit industry.
The "sweetness" of the first innovation also inspired Dongguan Silang to think about the independent research and development of products: there are so many types of biscuits on the market, how can we innovate and make unique products?
At that time, the new products were well received, which also showed that consumers were increasingly demanding food. Can we not only eat well, but also eat healthily on the basis of delicious and convenient? Yuan Weicheng, deputy general manager of Dongguan Silang, recalled that since then, the company has gradually clarified the development direction and aimed the "focus" of innovation on the research and development of healthy biscuits.
In 2002, the company launched the "Fiber Bran" series of coarse grain biscuits with the concept of health preservation for the first time, setting off a "coarse grain health trend"; In 2006, the "Steamed Potato Workshop" biscuits were innovatively developed, which were steamed and baked to retain the nutritional content of potatoes. With the concept of health becoming more and more popular, Dongguan Silang's biscuits have won the "taste buds" of consumers and taken the lead in seizing the market of healthy food.
But Silang did not stop at the success of this innovation, and the diversified food development idea of "biscuit" also made the company have bolder ideas. "Cantonese people like to make soup and drink herbal tea, and have always paid attention to food supplements. Drawing on the wisdom of their ancestors, the R&D team thought about whether it was possible to add traditional Chinese medicine to biscuits to upgrade from healthy to 'effective'. Yuan Weicheng introduced that in 2008, Dongguan Silang launched the research and development of traditional Chinese medicine biscuits, and invested a lot of manpower and material resources with the goal of taking the "blue hat", with a total investment of 10 million.
From the research of national health food standards to the extraction of prescriptions, the research and production of biscuit formulas, to animal experiments and edible effect tests, 29 researchers after 7 years of painstaking research and 188 tests, finally developed two biscuits that help to laxatively moisten the intestines and enhance immunity in 2015 - Kanglisi and Renhou biscuits, and Dongguan Silang has also become the first biscuit company in China to obtain the health food label (blue cap) certification approved by the State Food and Drug Administration. After the product was launched on the market, Dongguan Silang also focused on direct sales to health institutions and physiotherapy centers, and the taste and efficacy of the products have been widely recognized and praised by consumers.
N breakthroughs in an innovation center: cracking the key field of precision nutrition technology.
The long-term experience of product innovation has enabled Dongguan Silang to form a unique advantage in the independent research and development and production of health products. Based on the concepts of "great health" and "medicine and food", the company has gradually expanded its business scope to different categories of products such as solid drinks and tablet candies, and has carried out research and development on eight health directions, such as hangover and liver protection, sleep aid, and lung cleansing, so as to accelerate the transformation and upgrading of the traditional food industry.
In 2022, Dongguan Silang and 8 professors founded the "Dongguan Chuangwei Precision Nutrition and Health Innovation Center". Different from the general health innovation center jointly established by political research, this center is led by enterprises and jointly initiated by a number of universities and scientific research institutions, focusing on the key industrial fields of the upstream and downstream of big health, and building a bridge between the scientific research achievements of precision nutrition and the landing of products and market sales.
The innovation center has gathered top technical personnel in the field of nutritional food in China and has reserved many high-quality scientific research achievements. The task of the enterprise is to connect production resources, feedback market demand, promote the rapid industrialization of R&D results, expand the radiation scope of products, and allow more consumers to use nutritious foods with strong targeting and good efficiency. Yuan Weicheng introduced that at present, the innovation center has achieved industrialization of a number of scientific research achievements. "For example, recently there is a walnut diester oil that can promote fat burning, and we are connecting with relevant manufacturers to develop products to promote this achievement. ”
In turn, the product will be launched into the market, and its sales will also provide financial support for food research and development and innovation. Relying on the Innovation Center, Dongguan Silang is committed to solving the "bottleneck" technology in the key field of precision nutrition, and injecting strong momentum into the transformation and upgrading of the traditional food industry in the Greater Bay Area.
The implementation of innovative products also relies on high-level production processes. Dongguan Silang in the development of its own brand at the same time, but also opened up the processing business, with high-standard hardware equipment and "soft power", for many famous food enterprises to provide a full range of solutions, including formula, production, packaging design, pricing, sales channels and other all-round, full-process solutions.
In terms of hardware, Dongguan Silang has introduced the world's leading automatic production line, which realizes the automation, precision and intelligence from the production of raw materials to the output of finished products, and promotes industrial upgrading. In 2020, the solid beverage and tablet candy production line put into production by the company cooperated with domestic high-quality smart factory manufacturers to realize intelligent equipment data collection, production quality control, and production site visualization, better collect and utilize production big data, and help enterprises to fully enter the big health industry with the construction of "smart factory + shared factory".
Yuan Weicheng said that in recent years, affected by the economic environment, the company has put more energy into the improvement of "internal strength", focusing on the research and development, production and efficacy testing of new products, and has achieved a lot of results in targeted functional food. Next, the company will strengthen marketing planning and sales channel expansion through live streaming and Internet celebrity cooperation, and connect with market resources. This participation in the 2023 Dongguan Food Industry Transformation and Upgrading Achievement Exhibition is also an important appearance of the company's brand promotion and new product display.
We will continue to improve our product research and development capabilities, do a good job in production quality management, and combine delicious food with effective and healthy eating, so that more consumers can have personalized precision and nutritious food. Yuan Weicheng said expectantly.
Written by] Wu Bitong Wei Jili.
*] Courtesy of the interviewee.
Author] Wu Bitong; Wakiley.
*] Southern Press Media Group Nanfang + client.