Elvis Eckardt Recruitment & Sales Solutions Limited is recruiting for a Global Technical Services Manager – Liquid Systems (Carbon Black – Inks & Coatings) on behalf of a global specialty chemicals organisation. This role is the central technical interface between customers, R&D, and commercial teams, driving the adoption and optimisation of carbon black materials in liquid systems for the global inks, paints, and coatings sector.
What You'll Do
- Act as the technical expert for carbon black applications in inks, paints, and coatings.
- Provide advanced troubleshooting on formulation challenges, including dispersion, flocculation, rheology, gloss, undertone, jetness and filterability.
- Support customers with grade selection, formulation optimisation and performance improvement.
- Lead technical discussions with senior customer stakeholders and formulation teams.
- Define best-practice dispersion techniques and application testing standards.
- Establish consistent laboratory testing methodologies across application labs.
- Build structured application datasets enabling faster technical recommendations.
- Support technical validation during product qualification and scale-up.
- Translate customer formulation challenges into clear R&D product development briefs.
- Partner with research teams on surface chemistry, structure optimisation and dispersibility improvements.
- Develop application maps and recommendation matrices for different coatings and ink systems.
- Lead technical investigation of customer complaints and root cause analysis.
- Work with manufacturing teams on critical-to-quality parameters and process optimisation.
- Improve product consistency and strengthen technical credibility with key accounts.
- Represent the company at industry conferences, technical workshops and customer technology days.
- Develop technical papers, presentations and knowledge tools supporting the commercial organisation.
- Establish global technical services processes and KPIs.
- Support the development of a high-performance technical applications team.
- Manage application lab investments, budgets and technical priorities.
What We're Looking For
- Master’s or PhD in Chemistry, Materials Science, Polymer Science or Chemical Engineering.
- 10+ years of experience in carbon black applications for inks, paints or coatings.
- Deep expertise in dispersion science, rheology, colour science and application testing.
- Experience supporting customer formulation development or application labs.
- Strong understanding of regulatory compliance and product stewardship.
- Ability to operate in senior customer-facing technical roles.
- Fluent in German and English.
- Willingness to travel across Europe.
Nice to Have
- Experience with applications such as: Conductive coatings, EMI shielding materials, Battery coatings, Digital inkjet systems.
Team & Environment
You will support the development of a high-performance technical applications team.
Work Mode
This is a hybrid position. Candidates can be based anywhere in Germany or Belgium.
We value diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive work environment. We encourage applicants from all backgrounds to apply.
