SMARTFORM: request for industrial partners to join the Industrial Advisory Board

Project description

Introduction

The SMARTFORM project aims to revolutionize the formulation industry by combining Design of Experiments (DoE) with Artificial Intelligence (AI). 

The formulation industry is an important link in the value chain to transform raw materials or semi-finished products into applications with specific properties by blending multiple components in specific ratios. These ratios are often analyzed via a brute-force approach where many proportions of all components are tested, hoping to achieve the desired properties. This costs a lot of time, manpower, and resources. Moreover, feedstocks are changing increasingly faster due to market demand (bio-based or recycled materials), geopolitical tension, restrictive legislation, or stockout. When the feedstock composition is slightly modified, these painstaking efforts usually need to be repeated, thereby spending valuable resources and generating waste materials. 

To alleviate these issues, experimental design, also known as design of experiments (DoE) , is used to reduce the number of tests required. DoE can generate highly informative, structured data at a limited cost and allows causal relations to be established. A major challenge in applying DoE in the formulation industry is that it should consider all available prior information and be able to cope with changing feedstocks efficiently. Consequently, a major objective of this project is to create a flexible DoE framework that meets this challenge. 

The available prior information can come in different forms, e.g., literature, or historical data. This information can reduce the number of tests required to obtain a product with the desired properties, but processing all this data has long been too time-consuming and complex. With the rapid growth in the possibilities of Artificial Intelligence (AI), it now becomes feasible to process this data and better understand links between different characteristics or the interaction between different molecular structures.

The added value of the project lies in its potential to significantly speed up innovation across sectors, from chemicals to consumer goods. By leveraging AI and DoE, SMARTFORM can uncover patterns and relationships between different components, leading to more precise and effective formulations. This can result in faster time-to-market for new products, cost savings, waste reduction, and improved sustainability. In the future, the framework could be used to enhance research and development efforts, leading to high-quality products and more efficient production processes across multiple industries.

Goals

The main goals of the SMARTFORM project are: 

• To develop a generic DoE methodology to set up highly informative mixture experiments with increasing complexity, for both parametric and non-parametric models
• To develop a methodology to develop AI models that can learn from old and/or new datasets and integrate this with DoE to select the “right” experiments
• To develop a sequential strategy to reduce the experimental cost when new input materials are under consideration

Request

To foster broader interaction with the industry, the project partners are looking for companies that wish to be involved in the SBO-part of this ICON-project as part of an advisory committee.

More specifically, the project partners are searching for industrial actors who face formulation-related challenges and want to understand the different factor interactions and process parameters that can affect desired product properties. Furthermore, companies with a strong AI or Design of Experiments (DoE) perspective, as well as integrator companies that aim to translate digital and data-driven approaches towards formulation companies are also welcome to join the advisory committee. 

The primary role of companies during the pre-project phase is to tailor the project proposal to the actual needs of the companies and thereby maximise the likelihood of future utilisation of the results. During the project execution, a two-way dialogue between the researchers and the user field involved remains essential to achieve the targeted knowledge transfer from scientific research to concrete applications. The primary role of companies during the implementation phase is: 

• to assist the research from an economic point of view;
• to assist in designing and preparing the translation of the results into concrete economic applications.

During the cSBO project execution, companies may contribute as member of the advisory committee. In addition, they may prefer to undertake parallel R&D activities that are related to the subject of the SBO project at their own expense. In the latter option, the parallel R&D activities are not part of the SBO project. Companies may explore the possibility to obtain funding from the Agency for Innovation and Entrepreneurship.

The Advisory Board is open to all interested companies, including companies established outside the Flemish region. 

Important notice: Companies that wish to be involved in this cSBO project, will need to be Catalisti-member. For more information on membership and membership fees, please contact Mathias Jacobs (mjacobscatalisti.be (mjacobs[at]catalisti[dot]be)). In compliance to SBO regulations, the following requirements apply during the project implementation: 

- All commercial members of the advisory committee are required to make a monetary contribution of minimum € 250/year in the case of an SME or minimum € 1,000/year in the case of a large enterprise or another organisation. This obligation does not apply to Catalisti INNOVATE and ENGAGE members.

- A commitment to a substantive contribution and a time investment to participate in bilateral consultations with the project executors and/or meetings of the advisory committee.

How to reply to this request

Please send an email to Mathias Jacobs (adeneyercatalisti.be (mjacobs[at]catalisti[dot]be)), and briefly describe your interest and potential contribution to the project. After submission of your offer, you will be contacted for more information on the project contents, and a Letter of Intent and Questionnaire will be provided to join the Advisory Board of the project.

Important notice: Partners that wish to participate in Catalisti-supported projects are required to be member of Catalisti. For more information on membership and membership fees, please contact Mathias Jacobs (mjacobscatalisti.be (mjacobs[at]catalisti[dot]be)).

Contact

Please contact Mathias Jacobs (mjacobscatalisti.be (mjacobs[at]catalisti[dot]be)) if you have questions concerning this RfP.

This Request for Partners is copyrighted by Catalisti vzw and its contents may not be reproduced without the prior written approval of Catalisti. This Request for Partners reflects the status of the proposed project on its date of release and the information contained herein may not be fully up to date or accurate. All information contained herein constitutes valuable information of Catalisti and may not be used for any purposes other than the evaluation of a person’s interest in participating in the proposed project.