Overview

This position resides within the Food Safety Center of Excellence organization of R&D located in Valhalla, NY. The incumbent will provide leadership to ensure that processing conditions meet commercial sterility to deliver food safety and quality requirements for Low and High Acid Aseptic Foods and Beverages. They will ensure that PepsiCo delivers compliance while delivering innovation needs with agility, leveraging a risk-based approach. This role will engage in critical collaborations with quality assurance, quality control, product development, process engineering, and commercialization teams

Responsibilities

• Develop and understand the concepts of thermal processing and bacterial kinetics to various food and beverage products to support regional R&D initiatives.
• Understand key manufacturing platforms and identify process control associated with each.
• Support the implementation of robust procedures to ensure the correct design, development, and approval of thermal and non-thermal processes to deliver microbiological control in line with PepsiCo and local regulatory requirements across all categories and technologies taking into account industry best practice.
• Maintain the TPA reference library of process parameters required to meet PepsiCo Food Safety and Quality standards across all categories and technologies.
• Support the thermal process aspects of the validation of new equipment, processes, products and packaging in conjunction with key stakeholders, R&D and Technical Services keeping aware of and up to date with industry technical developments.
• Subject matter expertise driving flawless innovation and in support of product stability and stability issue resolution.
• Support the Commercialization, Qualification and Verification (CQV) of new products, processes, and packages.
• Validation of existing processes to ensure they are capable to deliver the required level of microbiological product integrity.
• Review and issue scheduled processes for low acid aseptic products, file processes with FDA, and review process deviations and provide product disposition.
• Support Root Cause Analysis and Corrective Action and Preventive Action items to close Thermal Process related gaps.
• People Capability Build programs across our global organization - aseptic university trainings.
• 25-50% travel required

• The expected compensation range for this position is between $102,800 - $172,100.
• Location, confirmed job-related skills and experience will be considered in setting actual starting salary. Your recruiter can share more about the specific salary range during the hiring process
• Bonus based on performance and eligibility; target payout is 12% of annual salary paid out annually.
• Paid time off subject to eligibility, including paid parental leave, vacation, sick, and bereavement.
• In addition to salary, PepsiCo offers a comprehensive benefits package to support our employees and their families, subject to elections and eligibility: Medical, Dental, Vision, Disability, Health, and Dependent Care Reimbursement Accounts, Employee Assistance Program (EAP), Insurance (Accident, Group Legal, Life), Defined Contribution Retirement Plan.

• BS/MS/PhD in Food or Chemical Engineering, Food Science & Technology, Microbiology or other related technical field. PhD in these areas is highly desirable.
• Minimum 3-5 years (with Ph. D) / 5-7 Years (with M.S) / 8-9 years (B.S) of thermal processing experience in Aseptic Operations processing (Quality or R&D).
• SME in Aseptic processing, canning and hot fill processes, Thermal Processing / Alternative Preservation, and Microbiology.
• Drive agendas to meet business timelines; successfully handle adverse circumstances.
• Achieve quality results consistently despite obstacles. Monitors progress against goals, identifies issues and takes corrective action early.
• Long term strategic planning capability to support PepsiCo future vision.
• Team oriented person with skills that effectively bring people and issues to decisive resolution.
• Ability to develop positive working relationships with manufacturing personnel and gain commitment from others to accomplish work.