Imperial and BASF spinout SOLVE to digitally transform chemical manufacturing

A new spinout will use AI and innovative experimental methods to improve the manufacturing of products such as drugs and fertilisers.

Pandemic-beating drugs could enter production more quickly and agrichemicals such as fertilisers could be produced with fewer toxic raw materials thanks to technology from the new company SOLVE.

The spinout has been launched by Imperial and global chemical company BASF under an innovative partnership model, with funding from BASF subsidiary Chemovator in a pre-seed round led by venture capital firm Creator Fund.

It is using innovative chemical processing techniques to build up large sets of data on chemical reactions, which it will use to train machine learning models to rapidly predict the optimal ways to manufacture high-value chemicals.

The technology is designed to enable chemical companies to scale manufacturing of new chemicals more quickly and to optimise manufacturing processes.

This could make chemical production more sustainable by helping shift from toxic to benign materials, as well as by minimising waste and reducing energy use. It is also expected to reduce the costs of setting up and running manufacturing facilities, and to make supply chains more resilient to changes in the availability of raw materials.

One of the key parameters SOLVE will help optimise is choice of solvents. “Solvents often improve reactions but are not in the final product, so they're inherently wasteful and are subject to increasingly heavy regulation,” explained Dr Linden Schrecker, SOLVE CEO and founder.

“Even in the last decade we've seen the number of viable solvents drop, with many commonly used solvents being banned. We can provide clients with extra flexibility to vary how they manufacture a product.” 

Data-driven chemistry

SOLVE’s technology could herald a data-driven transformation of research and development in chemical manufacturing. At present, industrial chemists often use a combination of intuition and trial-and-error to find the best manufacturing processes, but the company aims to offer a more efficient alternative.

Dr Schrecker said: “Chemistry needs to become more data-driven. Once you do an experiment, the data should be stored in detail so you can make use of it later. In future there will still be room for creativity by scientists, but they will be working from a more solid foundation.”

The company is building up experimental data sets using novel techniques in flow chemistry, an advanced form of processing in which reactions are carried out in a continuous flow rather than in batch vessels. “The data we collect in flow is more accurate because we have a more precisely controlled set of conditions and plenty of control over how those conditions change. It’s also a more efficient way to collect the data,” says Dr Schrecker.

SOLVE's technology is based on techniques that Dr Schrecker developed as a PhD student at the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Next Generation Synthesis & Reaction Technology (REACT).

Dr Schrecker worked with Professor Mimi Hii from the Department of Chemistry and Professor Klaus Hellgardt from the Department of Chemical Engineering with co-supervision and funding from BASF. The technology was then trialled in an industrial project using Imperial’s Centre for Rapid Online Analysis of Reactions through Imperial Consultants. 

SOLVE will offer its services to a range of clients from across the chemical and pharmaceutical industries including BASF, which is already a customer. 

Innovation in technology transfer

In addition to its innovative technology, the formation of SOLVE has been hailed for its rapid speed and innovative multi-way collaboration between highly engaged stakeholders from government, industry, academia and the investment community.

The company was formed less than three months after the decision was made to spin out, a timeline that compares favourably to the sector-wide average of 11 months recently identified in an independent review of university spinouts commissioned by the UK government – a wait that can sometimes cause companies to lose competitive advantage.

Jamie Macfarlane, CEO of venture capital firm Creator Fund, was involved prior to the company’s formation and helped drive the formation through its investment.

He said: “At Creator Fund, we’ve proven that PhD students have the commercial and technical skills to build massively successful companies and we have a unique model to identify and support talented individuals early on. Linden is an exceptional talent and we’re excited to see where he takes the venture.”

Mr Macfarlane worked with Pedro Lovatt Garcia, a student investment partner at Creator Fund and Imperial PhD student who helped spot the commercial potential of Dr Schrecker and his technology early on thanks to his close links with the Imperial community.

“In an age where machine learning models are published online and feasible to replicate, the most interesting aspect of Linden’s approach was his unique method for generating proprietary chemical data,” said Mr Lovatt Garcia. “We started working closely with him to build SOLVE’s value proposition almost a year before the spinout process started, and by the time it was ready we made the deal happen as quickly as possible.”

“Linden is a great example of the exceptional PhD graduates with the potential to build massive businesses that we look for at Creator Fund.”

A new spinout model

The formation marks the first time in its 150-year history that BASF, the world’s largest chemical company, has formed a spinout in partnership with a university, and the first time that Imperial has formed a spinout with an industrial research partner.

Dr Viraj Perera, Director of Industry Partnerships and Commercialisation (Natural Sciences) at Imperial, said: “It’s a fantastic vote of confidence in the practical value of Imperial’s world-leading science and people that BASF has chosen for the first time to launch a spinout jointly with a university and invest its own funds – with a view not only to using this potentially transformational technology in-house, but bringing it to the chemical industries at large. We’ve been able to push the deal through quickly thanks to a highly engaged founder, investors and dedicated support from an Imperial Spinout Project Manager, Edmond Yau.”

Dr Christian Holtze, Academic Partnership Developer at BASF, sees the launch as a successful collaboration between the Germany-based multinational, Imperial, investors and the UK government. He said: “This is a great example of co-creation between academia and industry. Linden, as a PhD student, drove the process through his scientific excellence, dedication and his qualities as an innovator. We’re delighted to be translating research supported by Imperial, BASF and EPSRC into something that will meet the needs of chemical companies in a range of sectors and make an economic impact to the UK.”

Interdisciplinary training

The formation also reflects the environment provided by Imperial through its EPSRC-funded REACT Centre for Doctoral Training. Professor Mimi Hii said “REACT has been fantastic for providing not only interdisciplinary scientific training but the soft skills and networking students need to realise the real-world value of their research in a variety of sectors including industrial chemistry and entrepreneurship. Linden was one brightest students we worked with in REACT and is now applying the same interdisciplinary mindset.”

This article was first published on 12 July by Imperial College London.