Cuu Huynh, 58, was critically injured when his head became caught between a pressurised door on a machine and a railing at the company's Abbotsford plant on April 13, 2006.
He died in hospital seven days later from asphyxiation.
Fosters Australia Limited on Thursday pleaded guilty in the Victorian County Court to two counts of failing to provide a safe workplace.
The global beer giant faces fines of almost $1 million on each count.
Huynh was attempting to fix a problem with the depalletiser, a machine that moves empty bottles through a pressurised door to a chamber where the bottles are unloaded before being filled with beer, when he was killed.
Prosecutor Paul Holdenson QC told Thursday's pre-sentence hearing a worker had been injured in almost identical circumstances four years earlier, but the company had not improved safety since.
A similar depalletiser machine at the Abbotsford factory was fitted with a protective guard, the court heard.
Holdenson said workers at the brewery were discouraged from shutting down the depalletiser machine in order to fix its problems.
The court heard many workers at the factory were unable to read the company's standard operating procedures because they did not speak adequate English.
Holdenson called for Fosters to be fined a "substantial" amount.
The pre-sentence hearing before Judge Jane Campton was continuing.
