Formulations Scientist

Role Description

Eastman is seeking an experienced Formulation Scientist to join its Research and Development team in India. The role will have a balanced technical focus across Care Chemicals applications for the cosmetics and personal care industry and pharmaceutical excipients. The successful candidate will develop, optimize, and demonstrate the performance of Eastman’s specialty raw materials in customer-relevant formulations, while supporting technical problem-solving, scale-up, and new application development.
This position offers an opportunity to work at the intersection of formulation science, specialty chemicals, and customer-driven innovation. The scientist will collaborate with local and global R&D teams, commercial colleagues, customers, and other technical functions to convert market needs into differentiated formulation solutions for India and international markets.

Key Responsibilities

• Design and execute laboratory-scale formulation studies for Care Chemicals and cosmetics, including skin care, hair care, cleansing, color cosmetics, sun care, and related personal care applications, as well as pharmaceutical dosage forms using excipients.
• Develop and optimize formulations such as emulsions, creams, lotions, gels, serums, shampoos, conditioners, cleansers, dispersions, suspensions, tablets, capsules, and other relevant solid, liquid, or semisolid formats.
• Evaluate the functionality and performance of raw materials, excipients, and formulation components, including their influence on stability, texture, viscosity, appearance, compatibility, processability, sensory properties, release characteristics, and overall product performance.
• Investigate the effects of raw-material grade, concentration, processing conditions, equipment, and formulation variables; use structured experimentation and, where appropriate, Design of Experiments to identify robust formulation windows.
• Lead formulation optimization and troubleshooting activities for laboratory, customer, and scale-up challenges. Apply sound scientific reasoning and root-cause analysis to recommend practical solutions.
• Plan and support customer trials, technical evaluations, application demonstrations, and productperformance studies. Translate customer requirements into clear experimental plans and actionable technical recommendations.
• Collaborate with commercial teams and customers to recommend suitable Eastman materials, explain their performance and limitations, and support technical presentations, workshops, seminars, and industry events.
• Support scale-up, process transfer, pilot work, and manufacturing evaluations by connecting laboratory results with production processes, equipment capabilities, quality requirements, and commercial objectives.
• Prepare accurate and timely experimental protocols, laboratory records, technical reports, application notes, formulation guidelines, test methods, presentations, and customer-support documentation in accordance with company procedures, quality expectations, data-integrity principles, and safety standards.
• Monitor developments in cosmetic ingredients, personal care trends, pharmaceutical excipients, drug-delivery technologies, formulation science, sustainability, and applicable regulatory expectations. Contribute to new product development, intellectual-property assessments, invention disclosures, and technical publications as appropriate.
• Promote a strong culture of laboratory safety, responsible care, ethical conduct, inclusion, quality, and continuous improvement.

Basic Qualifications

• Master’s degree in pharmaceutics, pharmaceutical sciences, formulation science, chemistry, chemical engineering, cosmetic science, or a related discipline is preferred. Candidates with a bachelor’s degree and substantial directly relevant experience may also be considered.
• Approximately 5–10 years of hands-on experience in formulation development, application laboratories, pharmaceutical R&D, personal care or cosmetics R&D, excipient development, specialty chemicals, or technical service for raw-material suppliers.
• Demonstrated experience in at least one of the two core areas—Care Chemicals/cosmetics or pharmaceutical excipients—with practical capability and strong interest in contributing across both areas.
• Experience in planning and executing laboratory experiments, interpreting formulation and characterization data, resolving technical issues, and preparing clear, well-structured technical documentation.
• Experience working with customers, commercial teams, manufacturing, quality, regulatory, or global technical teams is desirable.
• Ability to travel domestically and internationally, as needed, to support customer projects, technical trials, industry events, and business activities.

Technical Knowledge and Skills

• Sound understanding of formulation principles, ingredient functionality, excipient and raw-material compatibility, stability testing, laboratory-scale processing, and product-performance evaluation. 
• Practical knowledge of cosmetic and personal care systems, including emulsions, dispersions, gels, creams, lotions, shampoos, conditioners, cleansers, and serums, together with knowledge of pharmaceutical dosage forms such as tablets, capsules, suspensions, and other relevant systems.
• Hands-on experience with relevant equipment such as viscometers or rheometers, pH meters, particle-size analyzers, dissolution or disintegration equipment, texture analyzers, mixers, homogenizers, stability chambers, and related laboratory instruments.
• Familiarity with applicable Indian and international expectations, including current Good Manufacturing Practices, relevant pharmacopeial requirements, ICH principles, cosmetic and personal care regulations, ISO-based quality systems, laboratory safety, and data integrity.
• Ability to use spreadsheet-based data analysis, statistical tools, electronic laboratory notebooks, laboratory information systems, and standard technical-documentation platforms. Experience with Design of Experiments, formulation modeling, or statistical evaluation is an advantage.

Key Competencies

The successful candidate will be scientifically curious, customer-focused, collaborative, and comfortable working across multiple application areas. Strong experimental discipline, analytical thinking, practical problem-solving, attention to detail, project ownership, and clear written and verbal communication are
essential. The ability to explain complex technical findings to both technical and non-technical stakeholders will be important.

Career Growth and Development Opportunities

This role provides a strong platform for building a long-term career in specialty chemicals and applicationfocused R&D. The successful candidate will gain exposure to Care Chemicals and cosmetics technologies, pharmaceutical excipients, customer-driven innovation, technical service, scale-up, product development, and global collaboration. As expertise develops, opportunities may include ownership of strategic application platforms, leadership of customer and market-development projects, mentoring of other scientists, participation in intellectual-property activities, and progression toward senior technical, project leadership, or regional and global R&D roles.