Hermann Immanuel Kunstmann, a German immigrant, born in Dresden in 1830,

In 1850, the young Kunstmann, with the energy and vision of a 20 year old young man set the foundations for a solid industry, which provided work and production, and lasts until today. In the X Region on the Isla Teja island, next to the city of Valdivia, in 1853, Kunstmann installed a small water driven Mill.

A simple and rustic stone mill was, 145 years ago, the base of what today is a great industrial complex. Hermann I. Kunstmann founded the first Mill, which during 1862 was destroyed by floods. In less than 12 months he had built a new one. This time he founded Collico, on the site on which the company still remains.

In 1914 they built an alcohol distillery, which was the basis of the first yeast factory installed in Chile in 1922.

The natural restlessness of H: I. Kunstmann would bring him to diversify founding a tannery which produced important volumes for export. At the beginning of the present century, the founders grandsons, Eduardo and Victor Kunstmann, asumed the management of the company, replacing H. I. Kunstmann and his son Hermann who died in 1909 and 1908 respectively. Under the administration of the brothers, the company consolidated into what it is today, importing German Tecnology. In 1914 they built an alcohol distillery, which later in 1922 would be the basis of of the first yeast company in Chile. During 1993 Levaduras Collico S.A. was associated with the transnational Burns Philp, the one was acquired in 2004 by the British group ABF, which is present in the region through AB Mauri Hispanoamérica, operating this way with 32 factories in over 20 countries.

ABF
AB Mauri Hispanoamerica