Innovation Growth Areas
Evonik is driving forward the green transformation of industry. With our new innovation strategy, we are stepping up our focus on sustainability. To this end, we are bundling a large proportion of our R&D activities in three new innovation growth areas. These should generate additional sales of €1.5 billion by 2032, compared with 2023.
| R&D expenses (2023) | €443 milion |
| R&D ratio | 2.9% |
| No. of new patent applications filed (2023) | 227 |
| Patents held and applications filed | approx. 23,000 |
| R&D employees | approx. 2,700 |
| R&D locations | more than 40 |
Developing sustainable innovations is vital for our focus on profitable growth. In this way, we help our customers achieve their own climate protection, circularity, and biodiversity targets. Examples of our innovative contribution to a sustainable transformation are our membrane technologies and our lipid nanoparticles for mordern mRNA vaccines.
At present, our operational chemicals divisions account for around 83 percent of our R&D expenses, while Creavis - Evonik's strategic innovation unit and business incubator - accounts for 14 percent.
Evonik has an extensive patent strategy to protext new products and processes. The value and quality of our patent portfolio have increased steadily in recent years. In 2023, 227 new patent applications were submitted, and we had around 23,000 patens and pending patens.
Our R&D pipeline comprises a balanced mix of short-, mid-, and long-term R&D projects. On the one hand, we constantly strive to improve our processes in order to strengthen our cost leadership, and on the other, our projects open the door to new markets and news fields of technology. Our project portfolio is consistently aligned with our innovation growth fields and Next Generation Solutions, which have high sustainability benefits.
Scientific Relations
We cooperate with research institutes, universities and other industrial companies so that the latest findings in chemistry, biology and physics can rapidly be transported into our company, and to foster science and education.
Through strategic partnerships we are linked to leading universities in the USA, China, and Japan, and to Singapore’s state-run research agency (A*STAR). In 2016 Evonik extended its partnership with the Ruhr University in Bochum (Germany), where it is sponsoring a chair in organic chemistry for five years. Our support for our established partnership with the University of Duisburg-Essen in Germany comprises a junior professorship, ten scholarships for doctoral candidates and joint projects. In addition, we are a preferred partner of Munich Technical University. We have been running a joint laboratory with Shanghai Jiao Tong University for several years.
The "Evonik Meets Science" forum is held regularly in Germany, China, Japan and the USA to strengthen networking with leading international research scientists. At these forums, our experts engage in discussion with leading scientists from a wide range of disciplines and institutions and present their joint research findings.
Partner Institutions Americas
Partner Institutions EMEA
- Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT)
- RWTH Aachen
- Technical University of Munich
- University of Duisburg-Essen
Partner Institutions Asia
The Fellowship Program
Our Fellowship Program honors outstanding Evonik researchers who have pioneered significant innovations and thus made a major contribution to the company's success.
In order to make the knowledge of these Research Principals available to the company, they act as expert advisors, for example in decisions on investments in specific technologies or on sustainability issues. They also help Evonik identify and develop talent and actively support young researchers as mentors. Other employees also benefit from the Research Principals' expertise: They share their experience and know-how with other colleagues in internal training courses and other knowledge transfer projects. They also act as external ambassadors for Evonik's research excellence, for example by raising awareness of the company's scientific excellence at universities.
Innovation Challenges
We are looking for your ideas to solve the great challenges of our time!
Are you a scientist, student, technology expert, entrepreneur, customer or supplier? We are open to collaborations that help us to master our challenges.
Creavis
Our mission: Creavis is Evonik's strategic innovation unit and business incubator. We are the pioneer of sustainable solutions for a better life.
Venture Capital
As Corporate Venture Capital unit, we play a strategic role in Evonik’s goal to become a best-in-class specialty chemicals company.
Skin Institute
Bringing together passionate scientists and advanced technologies, the Evonik Skin Institute designs more insightful proof of concepts for the next generation of beauty ingredients.
