1. And this is important, you hire a Chemist to determine “every aspect of the production (e.g. suppliers, exact formulation and heritage).” To have what is for all intents and purposes a layperson participate and supervise is a drag on the R&D. Also, no offense, but Formulators learn to know which lines will be easy to work with. That term is a huge red flag that the client will demand that I justify in real time every selection, dot, and comma. You have undefined marketing terms but few technical terms. All told, I would see these as barriers to the market. HONESTLY, if you are qualified to cooperate and supervise a Chemist, ironically you wouldn’t need a Chemist.
2. I have a closed facility, In my lab, there are all sorts of other line’s IP visible and vulnerable. Since you are not an employee, you wouldn’t even be allowed in AS I take my NDA’s extremely quite seriously.
3. Now, you are assuming that the R&D is a linear process where we develop the projects from step 1 directly to Step 2 and so forth. It is not. During testing, there will be 7 and 28 day periods where the sample is in stability. Would you wait in the car?
4. As Mark touched on you have a hodgepodge of marketing terms, but not a single useful, acceptable or clearly technical term that helps in the R&D process.
5. This sounds much like it would demand so much time as you “direct” the project that it would be a fulltime use of my lab. This could lead to a compromise or reduction in services to my existing clients, the ones I have had for 10 years and send me numerous projects a year.
In summary, over the years I have had some start-ups and emerging lines early on in my practice which had many of these “danger signs” and over the years I have screened for them. Here is my advice. Get a Chemist. Do a comprehensive Product Development. Let them work. THEN, do what you really need to do, let them work, pivot and then you would work on branding your line and products.
Please don’t see these comments as direct negatives. Honestly, I hope it brought up some issues that you would need to confront before getting into the process.
That said, I truly and sincerely wish you all the success with your projects. Have a Happy Holidays.