Working closely with industry is a daily activity at AEP Polymers.

Depending upon the size and complexity of each project, AEP offers qualified support through different routes of collaboration, from contract research to R&D funded projects.

The simplest case is represented by laboratory services, where AEP can support the occasional or periodical request of clients to carry out specific measurements or tests.

In case the scope is limited and well-defined since the beginning, a consulting project is the right way to deliver results in the expected timeframe, usually ranging from a few months to a year. When uncertainty is high, AEP suggests a modular approach, where a decision gate at the end of each module allows informed decision about proceeding with the project or stopping it.

When the scope is broader and cannot be fully defined in advance, the contracted research can take the form of a master service agreement: the work plan is periodically agreed with the client in an adaptive manner based on experimental results, and AEP experts dedicate prioritized time to the project. This way, thanks to the close collaboration between AEP and the client, most value is collected in the shortest time.

Finally, when the project scope and ambition are so wide that many diverse expertise are needed, a funded R&D project is the right tool to gather all the necessary partners and lower the financial risk related to the high uncertainty of results.