Polymer Chemistry Intern

The tile on a wall or the panel in a car could have started life as a chip packet. Turning that idea into something you can actually hold is the job.

Without® is a Pune-based Certified B Corp taking on one of recycling's hardest problems: multilayer plastic (MLP) packaging and mixed textile waste — the stuff conventional recycling can't touch. Through our patented chemo-mechanical technology, VerdiCycle, we convert this impossible-to-recycle waste into engineering-grade recycled materials used across automotive, eyewear, packaging, and home & garden. We've been featured on Shark Tank India and Business Insider, and we're currently scaling up our first commercial plant.

We're looking for a hands-on, curious intern to join our Science team and help turn our VerdiCycle materials into real composite products — the tiles, panels, and moulded articles that take recycled waste from an idea to a finished thing. You'll help fabricate, inspect, and test these products as we scale them from bench to production. It's a rare seat at the intersection of polymer processing and circular-economy technology, from lab-scale trials all the way to plant-level production.

You'll work directly with post-consumer waste streams — municipal waste containing flexible packaging, and textile waste — feeding directly into how we improve the technology.

You'll be embedded in our Science team, alongside the scientists and engineers building our core technology — polymer reformulation, composite fabrication (extrusion and moulding), and product testing across our product lines. Fair warning: this isn't a typical 9-to-5, and it's not a watch-from-the-sidelines internship. You'll run real trials, handle real waste, and see your work show up in products that ship.

What you'll do

Polymer Synthesis & Modification — Run depolymerisation, polymerisation, compounding, and formulation trials under supervision. Prepare samples for downstream testing.

Characterisation — Generate and interpret data from the techniques relevant to the sample — FTIR, GPC, DSC, TGA, MFI, rheometry, tensile and impact testing, optical microscopy. Know your instrument, know your data.

Data Discipline — Maintain the lab notebook and trial records to a standard that supports patents, TDS claims, and external audit. No shortcuts.

Collaboration — Work with polymer scientists, process engineers, and the manufacturing team to turn bench results into something that survives a pilot run.

Reporting — Produce clean trial summaries with the numbers, the method, and the uncertainty — not just the conclusion.

What we are looking for

Recently completed a Bachelor's or Master's degree in Polymer Science, Polymer Chemistry, Chemical Engineering, Materials Science, or Chemistry.

▸ Working knowledge of polymer chemistry and polymer physics — molecular weight and distribution, thermal transitions, crystallinity, degradation, structure–property relationships.

▸ Hands-on or coursework exposure to spectroscopic, chromatographic, and thermal characterisation. Tell us which instruments you've actually operated and what you measured on them.

▸ Comfortable with messy, variable input material and the statistics that come with it.

▸ Rigorous about records. If it's not written down, it didn't happen.

▸ Eager to learn fast in a lab where speed and accuracy aren't a trade-off — they're the expectation.

Nice to have (not mandatory, but will make you stand out):

▸ Experience with recycled or post-consumer feedstock, PET chemistry, polyolefin compounding, or additive formulation.

▸ Familiarity with ASTM or ISO test methods for plastics.

▸ Basic data handling in Excel, Python, or R.

Your Compensation

• Monthly stipend of 20,000
• 6 month, full-time internship with an internship completion letter
• Ready to join immediately