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Panasonic Launches Versatile NN-CD87KS Home Chef 4-in-1 Countertop Multi-OvenNew multi-purpose cooker expertly airfrys, bakes, broils and microwaves food to perfection

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Panasonic today introduced the latest in powerful and convenient multi-purpose cooking technology, the NN-CD87KS Home Chef 4-in-1 Countertop Multi-Oven. Designed for the busy lifestyles of culinary experts and novices alike, it expertly provides four versatile functions: airfrying, baking, broiling and traditional microwaving.

The Home Chef 4-in-1 Countertop Multi-Oven is even flexible enough to allow users to choose any one of the four cooking methods individually for quick, delicious foods and snacks, or in combination for a variety of fast, healthy, nutritious meals everyone will enjoy.

The Only Countertop Oven You Need
An uptick in busy lifestyles coupled with the desire for convenient, but fresh and healthy food has resulted in rapid growth in the ‘multi-cooking’ appliance category, including products like multi-cooker pots and toaster ovens with ‘convection’ function.

With four versatile cooking options that cook a wide variety of meals and snacks with precision and to perfection, Home Chef 4-in-1 Countertop Multi-Oven users won’t need separate appliances to make their favorite foods.

The airfry function, a healthier alternative to traditional frying, quickly circulates hot air around the food, even faster than convection, producing crispy, brown results. Food prep that requires broiling is also a cinch; dual infrared technology perfectly cooks foods on a broiling rack that lifts food close to the infrared grilling element, resulting in the crispiness missing from traditional microwave cooking.

Baking is also more convenient and efficient thanks to the Home Chef Countertop Multi-Oven, which can be a primary or secondary oven. The Convection Bake function ranges from 215° to 425°F, for baking and roasting without heating up the home or expending as much energy as traditional oven cooking.

Elevating Traditional Microwave Cooking
Functions such as the one-touch Genius Sensor Reheat button, which prompts the Home Chef 4-in-1 Countertop Multi-Oven to monitor the amount of steam generated by the dish, then automatically sets and adjusts the time to avoid over-or-undercooking, provides an additional layer of precision and convenience not seen in standard-use microwaves.

In addition, utilizing a smart microwave sequencing system based on the Inverter’s continuous-power delivery, the Turbo Defrost function protects and preserves food’s flavor, texture and nutrients – all without producing frozen centers or cooked edges.

Adding to its long list of convenient options, 20 auto-cook settings and 11 power levels provide the perfect heating levels and times for fast and perfect results in breakfast, grains, vegetables, entrees and more.

At CES 2020 Panasonic announced a collaboration with Drop, the leading recipe app, who’s guided, step-by-step recipe format is available for use with the new Home Chef 4-in-1 Multi-Oven. Drop ensures home cooks get the most out of their appliances with quick, easy, and delicious recipes using the full suite of features from Panasonic to deliver consistent, successful results. To find out more delicious recipes visit: https://drop.recipes/panasonic-usa

Sleek, Space-saving Design
A recent Panasonic survey revealed an average of nine small kitchen appliances are used in U.S. households, leaving little remaining counterspace for prep or other uses. At 1.2 interior cubic feet the modern, stainless-steel Home Chef 4-in-1 Countertop Multi-Oven has a spacious interior cooking area, but a compact exterior footprint to save valuable counterspace. For users preferring a built-in aesthetic, an optional trim kit allows users to build it into cabinets or walls

Electrolux Takes Action to Reduce Emissions From Cooling Products

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Electrolux have announced a plan to replace all high-impact greenhouse gases in all of its appliances by 2023 at the latest, as part of its commitments to the United Nations global Cool Coalition initiative. The plan, which helps Electrolux deliver on its objective to significantly reduce its climate footprint over the coming decades, is one of the actions taken under the company’s Better Living Program.

As global temperatures rise, the transformation of cooling technology will make a big contribution to the fight against climate change. The phase-out of powerful climate-warming gases known as hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) has the potential to avoid up to 0.4°C of global warming by 2100. HFCs are often used in refrigerators, air conditioners and other cooling devices, as well as tumble dryers and washer dryers with heat pumps.

Now Electrolux is accelerating the transition from these gases by submitting a phase out plan to the global UN initiative Cool Coalition. The commitment is a plan for replacing the high-impact greenhouse gases in all appliances with gases that have a lower climate impact, such as natural gases with very low global warming impact. By 2023 this plan will be complete.

“The appliance industry is one of the sectors with a vital behind-the-scenes role in the fight against the coronavirus pandemic as refrigerators, washing machines or air conditioners are essential products in people’s lives. Although these are uncertain times for business, we believe addressing climate change by reducing greenhouse gases remains one of the most urgent challenges for society. We are encouraging other companies in our industry to join us as we all share the same responsibility,” says Jonas Samuelson, CEO Electrolux.

Electrolux has far-reaching ambitions to reduce its climate impact, ranging from a science-based target to reduce CO2 emissions from products with 25% by 2025, to becoming fully climate neutral throughout the value chain by 2050.

Widening the scope of its sustainability strategy, Electrolux in 2019 also launched the Better Living Program, an initiative to enable better and more sustainable living for consumers around the world through 2030. Today’s announcement will contribute to the program, not least the target to make homes healthier and more sustainable through smart solutions for air, water and floors. (The target has been redefined subsequent to the launch, read more here).

The GWP (Global Warming Potential) reduction plan that Electrolux has presented to the UN outlines the switch to lower global warming potential gases in all product lines. For more details of the plan, please see: https://www.electroluxgroup.com/en/electrolux-and-the-uns-cool-coalition-30536/

Collaboration: Using LG’s patented technology, Miele will produce robot vacuum cleaners

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LG Electronics Inc. and Miele & Cie. KG have entered into a long-term patent license agreement covering robot vacuum cleaner technologies. The terms of the agreement will allow Miele to produce and sell robot vacuum cleaners using patented technologies developed by LG R&D.

The license agreement includes the use of LG’s patented induction signal guide and infrared-induced signals to enable robot cleaners to accurately and precisely return to their docking stations for charging. Other LG patents being licensed relate to dust unit detection and agitator attachment technologies.

“LG has long and storied history of investing in home appliances,” said Jeon Saeng-gyu, executive vice president of LG’s Intellectual Property Center. “Patent licensing agreements with major brands allow more consumers to benefit from the collective innovation of the industry.”

Pokemon Co. and kitchenware manufacturer Midea have teamed to create an entire line of Pokemon-themed kitchen products.

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Are you a Pokemon fan that also fancies themselves as a baker or chef? Well a new line of items is on the way, and they should be a perfect fit for your kitchen.

Pokemon Co. and kitchenware manufacturer Midea have teamed to create an entire line of Pokemon-themed kitchen products. You can find a selection of rice cookers, food heaters, toasters, electric teapots, and more. The lineup seems to be exclusive to Thailand for now

Romanian home appliance maker Arctic closes factory after 66 workers contract coronavirus

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Romanian home appliances manufacturer Arctic, a unit of Turkey’s Arcelik, said that it has temporarily closed its factory in Gaesti, in Arges county, after 66 workers contracted the coronavirus infection.

Arctic aims to restart production of coolers on June 2, while the refrigerator lines are planned to resume operations on May 25, it said in a press release on Saturday.

In the meantime, the factory will go through an intense disinfection programme.

All 4,000 employees working in Gaesti have been sent into technical unemployment until production line resume activity.

Arctic confirmed the first coronavirus case at the factory on May 7. None of the infected Arctic employees had displayed any Covid-19 symptoms.

Arctic Gaesti, established in 1970, was acquired by Arcelik in 2002. The unit manufactures three main brands of refrigerators: Arctic for the domestic market and Beko and Grundig mainly for exports.

In October 2019, Arctic opened a washing machie factory in Ulmi, also in Dambovita county, with a production capacity of 2.2 million units per year.

Panasonic will shut down a large appliance factory

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Panasonic will shut down a large appliance factory outside Bangkok as early as this fall and consolidate production to a larger facility in Vietnam for greater efficiency.

The Thai plant will stop producing washing machines in September and refrigerators in October. The building itself will be closed by March 2021, and a neighboring research and development centered will be shuttered as well.

The roughly 800 employees currently working at the Bangkok plant will be let go, but will receive help finding a different position within the group.

With the move to Vietnam, Panasonic seeks to reduce costs through consolidating parts procurement. The Vietnam plant, located outside Hanoi, is the company’s largest manufacturing hub for refrigerators and washing machines in Southeast Asia and has excess capacity.

The move also reflects a new phase in Southeast Asia’s manufacturing. Starting in the 1970s, Japanese electronics makers shifted domestic manufacturing to Singapore and Malaysia as the yen climbed rapidly after switching to a floating exchange rate, hurting Japan’s price competitiveness.

Later, production shifted to countries like Thailand, as Singapore’s wages grew to be too expensive. Now companies are looking for even cheaper locations, while also hoping to tap the massive potential demand for refrigerators, washing machines and microwaves in the largely populated countries of Southeast Asia, such as Indonesia, the Philippines and Vietnam.

Panasonic had been producing large household appliances in Thailand since 1979.

Total output will not decrease as a result of the change.

Panasonic currently employs about 8,000 people in Vietnam. In addition to large appliances, local units manufacture such products as TVs, cordless telephones, card payment terminals and industrial devices.

Panasonic is in the midst of restructuring efforts, with the goal of cutting costs by about 100 billion yen ($930 million) by the fiscal year ending March 2022. It is considering further changes to its appliance production.

Panasonic reported a 20.6 percent fall in group net profit due to weak sales of home appliances

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Panasonic Corp. on Monday reported a 20.6 percent fall in group net profit from a year earlier to ¥225.71 billion for the year that ended in March due to weak sales of home appliances and auto electronic parts, as well as the effects of the coronavirus pandemic on a range of its operations.

Panasonic expects demand to pick up in the latter half of the current business year after consumption was dented amid the virus spread, but it did not release an earnings projection.

For the 2019 business year, Panasonic’s group operating profit sagged 28.6 percent to ¥293.75 billion on group sales of ¥7.49 trillion, down 6.4 percent.

Chief Financial Officer Hirokazu Umeda said in a telephone conference that he expects sales to get fully back on track in the second half of this fiscal year, as many countries have started reopening their economies.

In April, its sales declined about 20 percent from a year earlier, with the largest drop of 50 percent in North America. But sales in China, a country that resumed economic activity ahead of others, was nearly flat for the month, he said.

The television division remained unprofitable in 2019, with a loss of more than ¥10 billion. Umeda said the company aims to turn the business into the black in the 2021 business year through a range of measures, including a possible business tie-up.

For 2019, the company attributed the poor results to falling demand for home appliances, particularly in Europe. It also acknowledged weak sales of automotive equipment in China.

The company suspended production lines at domestic and overseas factories, including in China, Malaysia and India, as the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted supply chains and prompted authorities in many countries to issue stay-at-home requests.

De’Longhi new chief executive

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Massimo Garavaglia has assumed the role of Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and General Manager of De’Longhi SpA on May 1, 2020. He succeeds Fabio de ‘Longhi, who remains in the company as Vice Chairman.

Fabio de ‘Longhi served as CEO for 15 years and will continue to play a significant role in the company. He will assist his successor in the transition phase and in the future will focus on employees and the corporate culture, innovations and M&A.

With Massimo Garavaglia, the De’Longhi Group will consistently continue the growth path it has embarked on in recent years and, at the same time, strengthen its management with an extremely experienced manager who will confidently meet the challenges and opportunities of a constantly changing market.

Yate Factory closes as several staff test positive for Covid-19

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Whirlpool Factory in Yate has closed after a number of staff tested positive for Covid-19

The factory has now been closed for over a week, following the outbreak of coronavirus amongst staff at the site.

The Whirlpool Factory was closed after the first employee tested positive on May, 3. Subsequent positive test results for Covid-19 of staff members, have since been reported .

In a statement, a Whirlpool spokesman said:

“On May 3, one of our colleagues at our factory in Yate, South Gloucestershire tested positive for Covid-19.

“As a precautionary measure, we decided to temporarily close the facility and carry out a deep clean and a range of other steps.

“Since then a small number of other staff members have also tested positive with the virus.

“Our thoughts are with all these colleagues and their families at this time and we wish them all a swift recovery.

“The factory has remained closed since and will not be reopening this week.”

Whirlpool said it would continue to monitor the situation daily.

“The plant will only reopen and resume production when assessments show it is safe to do so.

“People’s safety is always our top priority, especially that of our dedicated colleagues. We have been closely following official advice on workplace practices and social distancing in relation to Covid-19 at the Yate plant and all our other facilities around the world.

“We have created additional steps at Yate including provision of personal protective equipment (PPE), hand sanitiser and handwashing facilities and mandatory wearing of face masks.

“Temperature checks would be carried out for every employee before they are permitted on site and alterations would be made to the factory layout, workstations, offices and communal areas to allow greater social distancing.

“Production has been reduced and there are fewer staff on site, with those that can working remotely.”