Product Research and Development
Who Are Product R&D Services for?
In today’s increasingly competitive markets, product research and development services are drawn upon by everyone from hungry entrepreneurs with product ideas in hand, seeking acceleration in areas such as market identification and material selection consulting, to multibillion dollar global corporations in pursuit of innovative, effective ways to find process efficiencies and speed time to market. These types of services supplement and complement your core competencies, delivering an immediate competitive edge by way of specialized expertise and additional resources that it may simply not be practical to keep in-house.
While there is no “typical” product R&D client, at least one of the following will usually apply to those for whom these services are best suited:
- Interested in early-stage ideation and concept shaping for product innovation, drawing upon the potential of cutting-edge materials
- Seeking highly targeted market penetration opportunities
- Looking for ways to accelerate an in-progress product development cycle
- In need of innovative material and/or process solutions during the reduction of product concepts to practice
- Seeking to develop an intellectual property position by pursuing patents in a technology area
- Looking for ways to enhance the environmental sustainability of products and/or processes
- Troubleshooting to overcome product yield and quality issues
- Needing to optimize and leverage existing technology via product documentation and technical writing
- Uncovering any ways of gaining an edge over current and future market competition
When Is Product R&D Useful?
Product research and development services can be useful at any or all stages of the product life cycle, from ideation to prototyping to production, and even beyond, as you seek to optimize and maximize market opportunity and profit from existing products. Wherever you may be in your development cycle, we can help — bringing expertise and resources that continue to prove their value as your product moves forward to market.
Components of Product R&D
Many types of services can be considered to fall within the scope of product research and development. As mentioned above, different services can be applied, no matter where you are in your product creation process. Services provided by Bicerano & Associates include:
- Initial product and market research
- Competitive intelligence on the current and future technology and market landscapes
- Early-stage ideation and concept shaping through exploratory R&D
- Product and process technology, business, and market opportunity assessments
- Development and optimization of product formulations and manufacturing processes
- Laboratory facilities for prototyping and material characterization
- Deformulation and reverse engineering of competitors’ products
- Identification of universities and nonprofit research institutions as resources for potential collaboration in product R&D
- Customized strategic manufacturing partnership identification
- Technical writing for products — whether new or existing — to leverage technology and expertise, and standardize institutional intelligence
- Commercialization strategies and optimizations
- Product upgrades, enhancements, and redesigns
In short, product R&D is useful literally from the beginning to the end of a product lifecycle, and can aid not only in optimizing product development, but also in getting the most out of your existing, legacy research, knowledge, products, and personnel.
How Are Product R&D Services Implemented?
It is useful to understand the underpinnings of a product R&D consultancy, but it may be even more beneficial to see some examples of how these services are put into practice — how they directly create value for you, the client. Depending on your needs, the services requested, and the specifics of your product, the practical output of our services may comprise:
- Technology, business, and market opportunity assessments; competitive intelligence, ideation, and concept shaping. It is most common for a client to request such services at an early stage of entry into a new technology area and/or during the exploratory stage of an R&D project. See our technology assessment page for further information about some of these services that can be customized to meet your needs.
- Leading our clients through intellectual property searches, the conception and development of inventions, and patenting process, to build patent protection for their technologies. Dr. Bicerano’s work has led to the filing of dozens of patent applications for five different clients, listing Dr. Bicerano either as a coinventor or as the sole inventor with the commercial rights assigned to the client, resulting thus far in 30 issued U.S. patents in nine distinct patent families for four clients.
- Continued help and guidance throughout the entire product development and commercialization effort through our expertise in polymers and composites. Our services include help with material selection, design, and development, optimization of product formulations, material characterization, deformulation and reverse engineering of existing products, optimization of manufacturing processes, troubleshooting, enhancing the environmental sustainability of our clients’ technologies, and technical project management services. Please click on OmniPropTM, Syntho-Glass XTTM, and ColorSet Composites for examples of major new products that we have helped three of our clients develop, and Polymer Expert for a major new product resulting from work with a business partner under a joint development agreement.
- Access to world-class product research, material characterization, product testing, prototyping, and manufacturing laboratory facilities and expertise, through our extensive network of professional connections. The Material Testing and Characterization page describes the resources of our strategic partner for analytical laboratory services. The capabilities of specialized service laboratories focusing on advanced composites, textiles, materials used in oil and gas exploration and production, surface science, and optics, as well as of laboratories at universities and nonprofit research institutions, have also been utilized when needed in past projects.
- Technical writing needed by our clients in their product and process research, development, and marketing efforts; including the writing and editing of "white papers", books, manuals, brochures, reports, press releases, and proposals for our clients.
With the expertise of Dr. Bicerano as our focal point, we look forward to serving as a comprehensive Solution Provider for your product R&D needs.
Looking for more information on this subject? Check out these posts from Dr. Bicerano's Blog: