Over recent decades the coatings industry has experienced huge structural change. The major multinationals have grown by acquiring smaller companies, subsequently consolidating R&D capabilities on a global basis. Remaining smaller companies have survived by concentrating on specialist niches. Indeed, paint companies of all sizes have focused their strategies on specific application segments, so their R&D organisations also sought excellence in ever narrower fields. As a result, most companies are now unable to provide the broad learning environment that in the past resulted in the rounded, complete formulation chemist able to operate across the wide range of technologies and applications that ...