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Accelerating innovation in formulation, materials and manufacturing

The UK’s National Formulation Centre

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CPI works to develop, de-risk and accelerate your new products and processes to market. We achieve this by using innovative formulation technologies harnessing our expertise and state-of-the-art facilities and equipment, alongside a deep knowledge of the funding landscape. 

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Optimising your materials, formulations, technologies and manufacturing processes is a crucial part of turning your great idea into a commercial success. CPI Formulation has world-class skills, analytics and equipment to achieve this. Housed in industry-relevant facilities, we offer tailored solutions for developing and optimising your liquid and powder formulations, nanomaterials, composites, chemical processes and new technologies.

Through advanced experimentation, data analytics, modelling & simulation, as well as our process engineering expertise, we can help you gain a deeper understanding of your product and manufacturing process giving you full confidence in your material, formulation and technology decisions. Our extensive capabilities and industrial experience will help you develop, optimise and scale up faster, bringing your improved product, process or technology to market sooner. 

Our technologies

Formulation is used across diverse markets to produce a wide variety of everyday as well as extraordinary products, for example, when producing medication tablets containing active pharmaceutical ingredients or creating the ideal paint, coating, detergent; through to complex and specialist industrial products such as composites for aircraft or batteries for electric vehicles. 

Formulation science is a complex area involving the creation of multi-component, often multi-phase, products delivering benefit to the end-user or consumer. It is therefore crucial that the manufacture of these products is competitive globally.

CPI gives you access to our state-of-the-art facilities and the expertise of our highly skilled people, enabling you to overcome processing and product challenges and bring your great ideas to market faster. 

On this page

    Enabling innovation

    We can help you overcome challenges in formulation, processing and scale-up, providing novel solutions tailored to your platform and technology requirements.

    Our cross-sector expertise and knowledge allow us to drive innovation in product formulation and process optimisation across a wide range of market sectors. Our focus areas include sustainable battery materials, sustainable polymers, plastics and packaging, nanotherapeutics, fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) including paint, home and personal care, food and drink, agritech and sustainable composites and advanced materials, all underpinned by advanced digital solutions and sustainable process technologies. 

    We can help you with...

    • Battery Materials
    • Polymers, Plastics and Packaging
    • Nanotherapeutics
    • Fast-moving Consumer Goods
    • Agritech and Agrichemicals
    • Composites and Advanced Materials
    • Process Technology
    Developing premium compostable bio-packaging from sustainably-farmed seaweed
    Oceanium
    Creating a next-generation bioimaging molecular probe
    Stream Bio
    Advancing the development of safer, more sustainable battery technology
    LiNa Energy
    Collaboration will revolutionise treatment of diabetes

    For more information

    Melanie Geer

    Melanie Geer

    Business Development Manager

    Connect
      Talk to Melanie

    Nanomaterials

    Operating from purpose-built laboratories which enable industry-leading safe handling of nanomaterials, we specialise in the functionalisation, dispersion and characterisation of nanomaterials, including nano-powders (multi-kg), nanofluids and solid nanocomposites. We use nanomaterials to impart a range of properties into new products and processes including improvements in thermal, electrical, mechanical and barrier properties. Nano-enhanced materials developed in our laboratories see adoption across a range of market sectors from printed electronics to energy storage, from packaging to speciality chemicals. 

    Colloid science

    We support our customers to develop and optimise a range of product types such as emulsions, dispersions and the application of encapsulated additives destined for the coatings, nanomedicines and consumer products markets. These can be made at a range of scales and our labs include continuous micromixing pilot lines suitable for producing e.g. nanomedicines for use in targeted drug delivery.

    We use a range of measurement techniques including rheology, particle sizing and zeta potential which provide valuable insights into product dispersion and stability properties and enable formulations to be developed with the desired product attributes. We have techniques to measure the stability of dispersions and emulsions in real-time or at accelerated timescales. 

    Polymer processing and composites

    Polymer processing capabilities via extrusion are combined with significant polymer chemistry expertise to allow for bespoke product development in areas such as more sustainable packaging, biodegradable plastics and novel 3D printable polymers. This polymer blending capability is complemented with an ability to incorporate nanomaterials (and other powder and liquid additives) into both thermoplastics (via additive feed extrusion) and thermosets (via dispersion in precursor resins). Demonstration of these novel polymeric blends in use is also possible in our laboratories using our in-house 3D printing, injection moulding and resin infusion capabilities. 

    Material and formulation optimisation

    By applying scientific knowledge to link a formulation and/​or material’s structure to its application performance, CPI can provide knowledge-based optimisation of material design. Characterisation enables quantification of performance or composition using techniques that assess a wide range of both surface and bulk properties for a given material/​formulation. In combination with in-house expertise across a range of industries, these techniques can be combined to give insightful information to improve a product’s performance. 

    Automated experimentation

    We support companies with rapid and efficient generation of robust data sets using automated experimentation and screening methods; enabling our clients to evaluate automated methods and investigate a much broader range of formulation possibilities. We have experience across a wide range of market sectors e.g. FMCG, inks and coatings, batteries, lubricants, adhesives. 

    Our Automated Formulation laboratory is equipped to handle and process most types of materials and screen for a wide range of properties including mechanical, thermal, stability, optical and surface, chemical, and electrical.

    Modelling, informatics and data science

    CPI has recognised expertise in mechanistic and data-driven model building. Our mechanistic capability allows us to develop simulations of fluid, particulate and bulk solid systems.

    We have recognised expertise in data – driven model building for calibration, process development, soft sensor development and mode-based process control. With experience in implementation of online measurement for liquid and particulate systems our diverse set of PAT instrumentation can be used to probe and control liquid, slurry and granular material processes. 

    Process optimisation and scale-up

    Your lab-scale process or pre-lab idea is transferred into our own labs where our global award-winning team uses our state-of-the-art facilities to develop and optimise your process, ensuring its robustness and suitability for scale-up to commercial plant. The experimental results we generate are used in the early stage Process Engineering design of your commercial-scale plant, typically giving you a pre-FEED (Front End Engineering Design) report which can be used to attract future funding. 

    Scale-up and mixing rig has the exciting capability with inline measurement of viscosity and particle size and shape; software capability to achieve model predictive control; supporting soft sensor development.

    Process engineering design

    CPI’s global award-winning Process Technology team has significant experience in the development of new and novel processes and technologies across all processing industries. We help you throughout your journey to commercialisation, by providing engineering services which include: 

    • Technology assessments 
    • Concept studies 
    • Design and commissioning support 
    • Economic assessments 

    We use the same approach to help you to improve and optimise existing processes on your journey to Net Zero.

    Powder technology and processing

    Powders are everywhere! From consumer products such as detergents and instant coffee to agrochemicals and pharmaceuticals. Due to their complex nature, powders can pose many challenges such as segregation, poor flow and dissolution. CPI’s powder technology and processing capability comprises a state-of-the-art lab equipped with a range of powder processing and characterisation capabilities as well as a team of scientists and engineers highly experienced in powder processing. This allows us to help you by: 

    • Developing new formulations and processes for the manufacture of powders via blending, granulation, coating, tabletting etc. 
    • Measuring and improving the quality of powdered products in areas such as flow and dissolution. 
    • Improving process control through the use of Process Analytical Technologies

    For more information

    Melanie Geer

    Melanie Geer

    Business Development Manager

    Connect
      Talk to Melanie
    CPI is your innovation partner to make your ideas a reality.