SABIC inks pact with CIPET & CSIR for research in plastics & petrochemicals

Saudi Arabia’s petrochemicals major Saudi Basic Industries Corporation (SABIC) has formed a strategic alliance with two of India’s premier government institutions, the Central Institute of Plastics Engineering and Technology (CIPET) and the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) for research and development in the field of chemicals and plastics. “These partnerships, while paving the way for close collaboration with both the organisations in multiple research areas, are testimony of SABIC’s commitment to partner in the government’s ‘Make in India’ vision by strengthening the chemicals and plastics industries’ research ecosystem in the country, boosting skills development and contributing to India’s growth story,” said SABIC in a press release.
 
Dr Ernesto Occhiello, executive vice president, technology & innovation, SABIC, said, “Collaborative projects with well-established scientific organisations and research centres are essential components of SABIC's global research programme. Through these partnerships (with CIPET and CSIR), SABIC will be able to leverage these institutions’ multidisciplinary research capabilities to achieve research excellence for SABIC that will greatly benefit the nation. It is also our desire to see that today’s collaboration will create a value-added ecosystem involving science and technology institutions, talents, industry, customers to benefit the people of India.”
 
Janardhanan Ramanujalu, Vice President, SABIC South Asia & ANZ said, “We firmly believe that the government’s ‘Make in India’ initiative rooted in the two strategic advantages of  research and human capital will be the next growth driver for India. SABIC’s strategy in India is aligned with India’s economic growth plans and we endeavour to provide customers the products, services and solutions they need in their rapid growth path.”
 
SABIC’s Master Umbrella Advisor Program Agreement with CIPET will leverage its expertise and state-of-the-art infrastructural facilities for an increased pace of research in specific areas of polymer processing computer aided design (CAD)/computer aided manufacturing (CAM) /computer aided engineering (CAE) and mould design for plastics and allied industries. The collaboration agreement also supports skills development to drive industry growth through an academic research partnership that provides for an annual scholarship for PhD students researching in the area of SABIC’s interest; support in designing of CIPET’s curriculum to include the latest technology developments; guest faculty from SABIC and providing a six-month internship opportunity to CIPET’s plastic engineering students at the SABIC Technology Center, Bengaluru.
 
Surjit Chaudhary, secretary, department of chemicals and petrochemicals, Government of India,said, “This collaboration with CIPET will take a step forward to polymer and plastics industries in the country in line to the Make in India vision of Government of India for developing new materials and technology in the country. CIPET and SABIC have joined hands in a partnership that will translate innovations and new technologies for rapid growth of the plastic /polymers.”
 
The master research alliance agreement with CSIR paves the way for collaborative research leveraging competencies of CSIR laboratories- in particular, the National Chemical Laboratory (NCL), Pune; the Indian Institute of Petroleum (IIP), Dehradun; and the Indian Institute of Chemical Technology (IICT), Hyderabad. CSIR has some of the best chemical laboratories in the country, focused on catalysis, polymer rheology, reaction engineering and petroleum processing amongst others. The tie-up also provides for funding to CSIR for chemicals/petrochemical/polymer research in a consistent way over a period of time, as they bring-in unique areas of expertise.
 
Dr MO Garg, director general, CSIR, said, “The collaborations have led to development of cutting edge technologies across various industry segments. Such engagements with industry have been of mutual benefit. The proposed agreement with SABIC is truly synergistic since SABIC is engaged in deploying cutting edge technologies for commercial production of knowledge intensive products.”
 
SABIC currently has research collaborations with IIT Mumbai -Monash in India and similar collaborations with several universities in Saudi Arabia – King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals, King Saud University, King Abdulaziz University, and King Abdullah University of Science and Technology – and with Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the United States, Cambridge University in the UK, the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics in China, ETH Zurich in Switzerland, the National Research Council in Italy and the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft in Germany.