Services

From scattered data to a decision you can defend.

Three of the ways you could work with ISG. Each engagement is scoped to the question in front of you, and each ends with something your team can act on.

Hydration & electrolytes Sports nutrition & performance Energy & caffeine Functional ingredients Women’s health Gut, immune & inflammation Sleep & relaxation Cognition Wearable technology
Project based
Scoped up front and confirmed by proposal: objectives, what is in and what is out, hour estimates per stage, and checkpoints between stages where you decide whether to continue, redirect, or stop. Large questions run in phases — one benefit area first, the next only once the first has earned it.
Embedded
Part-time on your team for a defined stretch. Recent engagements have run twenty hours a week across six months, for teams who need a scientist in the room rather than a document at the end.
Advisory
Shorter or open-ended questions, taken on against agreed priorities rather than a fixed deliverable. Work proceeds in the order you need it.

All three are billed hourly against an estimate agreed before work starts. Typical shapes: a written POV in two to three weeks — a recent phase covered thirty-one extracted studies in sixteen days. A full mechanism-and-ingredient mapping project runs six to ten weeks across three or four stages.

01

Discovery

Find the opportunity worth pursuing, and the evidence that supports it.

At ISG, our Discovery phase kicks off by aligning with your strategic goals, benefit-areas and innovation intent. We investigate global research, market trends, competitive landscapes and emerging ingredient and technology opportunities — converting a wide span of scattered data into focused, actionable claim maps and whitespace innovation zones.

What you could receive
01 A research brief summarizing opportunity themes
02 Claim-map visualizations highlighting pathways for differentiation
03 A whitespace deck identifying latent growth spaces your organization can position in
When it's ideal

At early stage innovation, when you're exploring new directions, validating markets, or reevaluating R&D funnel priorities.

02

Scientific Deep Dive

A structured PICO read on what the published evidence can and cannot support, accelerated by Evidentia Engine.

Our Scientific Deep Dive service brings a rigorous evidence-based lens. We deploy a structured PICO (Population, Intervention, Comparator, Outcome) methodology to assess the quality, consistency and relevance of published studies — clarifying where claim potential exists and where evidence falls short.

What you could receive
01 Evidence strength tiering across the studies that matter — high, moderate, exploratory
02 Claim viability mapping: what looks supportable now, what requires more work
When it's ideal

When you have an ingredient or technology in mind and need to validate its evidence base, or when you need to structure scientific output into business language for claims, regulatory, or marketing review.

03

Technology Optimization

Streamline the engine that turns science into claims — including Evidentia Engine, the machine-learning layer behind the deep dive.

The Technology Optimization service is about streamlining your science and innovation engine: refining processes, ensuring scientific integrity, improving efficiency, and integrating technology platforms where needed.

What you could receive
01 Workflow diagnostics — where your innovation process or claim-development chain is bottlenecked
02 Process maps, technology recommendations, and optimization roadmaps
03 Implementation support to embed best practices and scientific rigor into your systems
See Evidentia Engine ↗
When it's ideal

When you're operating at scale, or your innovation and claim-development team feels inefficient or disconnected — and you need to optimize how science becomes claims and opportunities.

How An Engagement Runs

Same arc, whatever the question.

Scope and duration follow the question. The sequence does not: frame it, interrogate the evidence, and leave your team with a decision they can defend.

01 Weeks 1–2

Frame the question

Align on the decision at stake, the benefit area, and what an answer has to survive — regulatory review, a claim, a board.

You leave with
A written question, scope, and success criteria
02 Weeks 3–6

Interrogate the evidence

Structured PICO review of the published record, with strength tiering and the gaps named as plainly as the support.

You leave with
Study summaries, evidence tiers, and claim viability
03 Week 7 onward

Build the decision path

Translate the science into the call in front of you: pursue, redesign, substantiate further, or walk away — and what it takes.

You leave with
A recommendation your team can act on and defend

Timelines shown are typical. Discovery sprints run shorter; research programs run longer.

Sample Deliverable

What you actually get.

An R&D Evidence Point of View states where an ingredient can carry a claim today, where it cannot, and what it would take to change that. Every assessment is measured against one written standard, so the answer is auditable rather than an opinion.

H1Claim-ready. Meets the standard now; suitable to anchor a claim, subject to regulatory review.
H2Emerging. Directionally positive but short of the standard, typically one qualifying study.
H3Exploratory. Hypothesis-level evidence; appropriate for research, not claims.
R&D Evidence Point of View
Black Cohosh
Evidence-to-Claim Readiness

21 trial observations from 12 studies in healthy women aged 41–65, tested across four benefit areas against an explicit standard for claim readiness.

Prepared for
Client R&D — redacted
Prepared by
Insight Solutions Group | Kelly Barnes
Date
March 2025
Claim-readiness by benefit area Table 1
Menopausal symptom support
Claim-ready. Three positive single-ingredient RCTs at 40 mg/day; five positive results overall, zero null. The area to lead with.
H1
Stress & mood support
Claim-ready, at the threshold. Meets the minimum bar — recommend using as a supporting claim, not a flagship.
H1-2
Sleep support
Emerging. One single-ingredient study only. One well-designed RCT away from H1.
H2
Metabolic support
Exploratory. One single-ingredient study only. Hypothesis-generating; not a claim.
H2-3

Net point of view. Black cohosh is claim-ready for menopausal symptom support and for stress and mood management. Sleep and metabolic support warrant further research investment; the evidence does not support positioning it as a multi-benefit claim-ready platform.

Excerpt from a client deliverable. Client name and full evidence tables removed.

What Arrives

Examples of what arrives.

Deliverables are shaped to the question, so no two engagements produce quite the same set. These are examples of forms the work has taken. Client names, and in some cases the subject matter, stay confidential.

Evidence-to-Claim POV 2–6 pages
A written standard, every benefit area graded against it, and a net point of view that says plainly which claims are supportable and which are not.
Ingredient–Mechanism Map Maps + 1–2 pages each
A benefit-territory landscape, then visual mechanism maps in hierarchical clusters, then the ingredients that act on each: evidence tier, high-level dosing ranges, and regulatory status across FDA, Health Canada, and EFSA.
Science Education Deck 15–40 slides
A physiology area translated for the teams who have to act on it — product, marketing, regulatory — with the evidence base intact.

Start where it hurts.

Tell us the question and what hangs on it. We will come back with how we would approach it, what it would take, and whether we are the right people for it.

Start a conversation