E-Ionhas created a wholly-owned Center for Innovation and Commercial Development, led by Boris Zhmud, to expand the privately-held companys friction-modification research and development program.
Zhmud, who joined the lubricity and oiliness additives supplier in 2007 as R&D manager, said the center came about after about a half year of discussions, receiving approval a few weeks ago.
The creation of our center reflects the management decision to separate strategic R&D from QA and day-to-day troubleshooting activities, Zhmud told Lube Report. The goal of the center is to foster innovation by efficient networking with other research centers and universities worldwide, to participate in industrial research clusters, to strengthen our internal competence base, to promote customer awareness about our research achievements, to handle IPR [intellectual property rights] questions, and to perform global market research, risk analysis and case studies.
E-Ion is headquartered in Brussels, Belgium. Zhmud said the Center for Innovation and Commercial Development will be in an office near the companys production plant in Ghent, Belgium.
At the moment we would entirely focus on lubricity problems and lubricity issues, he said. Everything is in a very initial stage, and we have a long way to go. The size of the center is going to be the minimum adequate for achieving our goals.
Financial figures for the center are not disclosed.