Unilever Head of Global Innovation Shares Details on AI- and Robotics-Powered Laundry Launch

Unilever has been known to use robotics in its R&D and manufacturing processes, and the latest innovation comes from within its laundry segment. 

Keith Rutherford, home care R&D head of global innovation, shared with CGT the details behind Unilever’s newest laundry detergent, Wonder Wash, created specifically for short and cold wash cycles. 

To save consumers time and energy, the company leaned on state-of-the-art robotics and AI-accelerated digital models to develop a laundry detergent that would clean clothes without leaving residue in as short as 15 minutes. 

Data-Powered Innovation

“In our R&D center, we used a capability that utilizes the million-plus data points over the last five years to design our formulations — even ahead of testing,” said Rutherford. “This enables us to carefully harness the knowledge from all the testing that we do across the world.”

These insights, he said, accrue data such as the level of ingredients within fragrance, surfactants, enzymes, and polymers to predict how they will perform under different laundry conditions, across various types of washing machines, water types and temperatures, and the number of stains on clothing.

“The computational models helped us to get better insights on how to formulate our products, without having to create thousands of prototypes to test,” said Rutherford. 

The AI-powered ingredient blend process has 35 patents pending.