Applied Data Scientist; Research Engineer – Digital Technologies

£26,000 – £40,500 per annum - dependent on experience**

CPI helps make great ideas and inventions areality. We’re a team of intelligent people using advances in science and technology to solve the biggest global challenges in healthcare and sustainability.

Through our incredible people and innovation infrastructure, we collaborate with our partners in industry, academia, government, and the investment community to accelerate the development and commercialisation of innovative products.

From health technologies and pharmaceuticals to sustainable food and materials innovations, we turn the entrepreneurial spirit and radical thinking of our people and partners into incredible impact that makes our world a better place.

CPI has an exciting opportunity for an Applied Data Scientist (Research Engineer – Digital Technologies) to join its established and growing Automation and Digital team within the Formulation Technology Team at our state of the art:
National Formulation Centre , based at NETPark in Sedgefield.

The ideal candidate will be across-disciplinary thinker, combining expertise in chemistry, physics, biology, or mathematics with strong data science skills. In this role, you will leverage modern computational, statistical, and cloud-based technologies to generate insights into complex materials, driving innovations across energy storage, sustainable materials, nanotherapeutics, and consumer goods. A strong foundation in materials at the molecular, atomic, or structural level is highly valued, along with a keen interest in the markets we serve—particularly energy storage, pharmaceuticals, and sustainable materials.

Experience in applying machine learning, high-dimensional modeling, or data-driven simulation on cloud platforms to address real-world materials challenges will allow you to make an immediate impact.

Reporting to a Team Leader, you will leverage your existing skills in data science and be further developed in strategically relevant areas such as Machine Learning (ML), Artificial Intelligence (AI), predictive modeling, automation of data capture/processing, and ML-driven Design of Experiments (DOE) methods. Using these skills across a combination of low-code platforms, Python scripts, and cloud-based technologies for scalable computation and data management, you will contribute to the delivery of innovation projects with our clients and support technical leads in providing advice and solutions to both internal and external stakeholders.

In addition, this role offers a unique opportunity to contribute to the development and operation of our 24 / 7 robotic formulation laboratory, integrating advanced automation with data-driven experimentation to serve our markets.

The Automation and Digital team’s mission is to deploy digital and physical technologies that improve efficiency and quality when innovating in the formulation sector, and enable the generation, curation and analysis of large data sets to produce insights. We combine our digital skills with industrially relevant knowledge, laboratory automation and high throughput experimentation, and state-of-the-art process characterisation, to provide a complete solution for companies seeking to accelerate innovation for new and existing product lines.

The team works with companies and organisations of all sizes from global multinationals to 2‑person start-ups, with project durations ranging anywhere from 1 month to 4 years.

You will be exposed to an immense variety of projects: in scale (anything from 1 month to multi-year projects); in area of application (batteries, sustainability, nanotherapeutics, FMCG, food and feed sectors) and technical scope of the techniques used.

You will be encouraged to explore new techniques (techniques both new to our organisation, and novel techniques emerging from academia). Training in new techniques—whether self-taught, peer training or through formal courses—is encouraged.

Some exciting projects the team have recently worked on are:

BatCAT:
BatCAT is the project that realizes the manufacturability programme from the BATTERY 2030 + Roadmap, creating a digital twin for…