Synlait Milk Ltd. is a New Zealand dairy processor selling dairy and plant-based nutritional products, ingredients and powders to multinational customers worldwide. It is headquartered in Dunsandel, Canterbury, with additional manufacturing sites in Auckland and Pōkeno, a Research and Development Centre in Palmerston North and offices in Beijing and in Shanghai. The company manufactures milk powders and foodservice products such as infant formula, adult and early life nutrition products, ingredients such as lactoferrin and foodservice products such as UHT cream.
Synlait has over 280 milk suppliers across Canterbury and the Waikato, and its subsidiary Synlait Farms also supplies milk from around the Dunsandel site.
It is also the owner of consumer dairy companies Dairyworks and Talbot Forest Cheese.
History
Synlait Limited was established in 2000, when dairy farmers and entrepreneurs Ben Dingle, Juliet Maclean and Dr John Penno purchased Robindale Dairy Farm in Canterbury,[1] and by 2005 it owned eight dairy farms. Around this time, Synlait had shifted its focus from dairy farming to the manufacture of dairy products.
Synlait commissioned its first spray drier in 2007, and the Anhydrous Milk Fat facility was commissioned in September.