Associate Director R&D EurAsia (Food R&D)

Location: Amsterdam; the role can be based in the Netherlands, Turkey, Russia, or Indonesia

Company

hirify.global develops and manages food and beverage brands across international markets.

What you will do

• Define and execute the EurAsia R&D strategy and multi-year master plan across innovation, renovation, productivity, nutrition, packaging, and technical excellence.
• Govern the regional innovation portfolio, including stage-and-gate processes, prioritization, resource allocation, and escalation routines.
• Enable country R&D teams to move consumer and customer opportunities from concept and feasibility through validation, commercialization, and post-launch learning.
• Scale reusable recipes, packaging formats, technologies, and best practices across Retail and Away From Home markets.
• Lead regional packaging, sustainability, product quality, technical risk, food safety, and regulatory readiness programs.
• Build the regional R&D network, capabilities, infrastructure, external partnerships, and talent pipeline while influencing senior cross-functional stakeholders.

Requirements

• 15+ years of progressive R&D leadership experience in food, beverage, or FMCG, including regional or multi-country leadership.
• Deep expertise in food product and packaging development, portfolio and program management, consumer and sensory insight, testing, scale-up, and commercialization.
• Experience translating business strategy and consumer needs into successful innovation and renovation pipelines.
• Strong business and financial acumen, including investment prioritization, cost and value engineering, budget, and resource management.
• Experience working across Manufacturing, Supply Chain, Procurement, FSQ, Quality, and regulatory functions, including technical risk assessment.
• Degree in Food Science, Food Technology, Chemistry, Engineering, or a related field; fluent English required.

Nice to have

• Advanced degree.
• Emerging-market experience.
• Experience building technical capabilities, infrastructure, teams, and external innovation partnerships.

Culture & Benefits

• Highly international environment spanning multiple markets and cultures.
• Cross-functional collaboration with Growth, Marketing, Away From Home, Supply Chain, Procurement, FSQ, Finance, Regulatory, and Global R&D teams.
• Exposure to suppliers, research institutions, universities, and external innovation networks.
• Focus on curiosity, collaboration, accountability, learning, resilience, and development of technical and leadership talent.