AkzoNobel has announced a €3 million investment in its Felling site, near Gateshead, which will enhance the business’s powder coatings manufacturing capabilities.

Rolling out over the next three years, AkzoNobel will streamline operations by creating a single, dedicated Powder Coatings customer service centre in Felling. This move will help closer collaboration between the customer operations team and the manufacturing site.

Employing over 600 people, the Felling site is one of AkzoNobel’s largest in the UK and has played an important role in the company for over 140 years.

Since 1792 the company has been supplying paints and coatings with a portfolio of brands – including Dulux.

The investment is the latest in the site, which has received €39.4 million since 2011. Alongside the Powder Coatings business, the Felling site is also home to AkzoNobel’s Marine Protective and Yacht Coatings business, which includes a ground-breaking R&D innovation campus which opened in 2019.

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Tomas Kluczewski, Regional Commercial Director for the Powder Coatings business in North Europe, said: “This move aims to further position our powder coatings business for growth, increase market speed and further improve quality for our UK and Ireland-based customers. With these investments we’re propelling our powder coatings business forward, ramping up market responsiveness, and elevating quality for our UK and Ireland-based powder coatings customers.”

The business is also expanding its digital offerings in Felling, along with other sites through the My Interpon portal, an online platform to streamline customer access to its range of powder coatings.

The move follows strategic investments in the AkzoNobel powder coatings business, such as the expansion of the Bac Ninh site in Vietnam and the investments in North American sites, to align with AkzoNobel’s new theme, Paint the Future.

AkzoNobel is an industry leader, active in 150 countries, offering paints and coatings for all types of building projects from brand new, green-certified high-rises in major cities to renovated residential buildings in remote areas.

Wijnand Bruinsma, Director of Sustainability at AkzoNobel said: “The ambition to Paint the Future lies at the heart of everything we do. As a company, we focus on three key sustainability topics: climate, circularity and health well-being. For such a thin layer, some of our paints and coatings play an important role in green buildings. Some paints and coatings can reduce buildings’ carbon footprint, both in the construction and use phases."