This case is intended to illustrate our process flow if we carry out a consultancy job. It typically starts with a question or problem. A question from a company could be if nanotechnology is useful to increase the lifetime of bread covered with marmalade. The main problem is that sandwiches with marmalade are not very tasty after a certain period.

Phase one:
As a start we will carry out several interviews with experts and make a literature scan. In the interviews with experts of several Universities and companies the solution routes and the several causes of the problem are extracted. In this case experts from Wageningen University (Agriculture and Food) and the University of Twente (Nanotechnology, chemistry) will be for example interviewed.

Phase two:
With the gathered information considering out of scientific literature, patent research and experts in the field we map the current status and solution possible routes. Together with the customer we can decide if it is useful to deepen several promising routes.

Phase 3:
After mapping the promising solution routes we look into availability of the solution. A strong-point of SolMateS is that we can quickly determine if a solution is commercially available or has to be still developed. A solution route is often commercially available or patented somewhere. If a promising route is not yet on the market we can estimate the effort to develop a certain solution route.