TO21 CO LTD

Their core work

TO21 CO LTD is a South Korean SME working at the intersection of nanotechnology, computational toxicology, and regulatory science. They contribute to the development of informatics tools and models for nanomaterial safety assessment — specifically building and applying computational approaches that allow researchers to predict how nanomaterials behave and what risks they pose without relying solely on laboratory testing. Their engagement in both ACEnano and NanoSolveIT places them squarely in the EU nanosafety research community, where they appear to bring digital and data-modelling capabilities to large international consortia. Their focus on cloud platforms and nanomaterial grouping methods suggests they are software-capable and oriented toward scalable, interoperable tools for regulatory and industrial use.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

TO21's first project, ACEnano (2017), focused on experimental characterisation and building a tiered analytical framework for nanomaterial risk — the groundwork layer of nanosafety science. By 2019, their second project NanoSolveIT shifted the emphasis entirely toward computational and informatics approaches: predictive models, nanomaterial grouping, cloud platforms, and IATA-compliant assessment workflows. This represents a clear progression from characterisation-based methods toward data-driven, in silico tools that reduce dependence on animal testing and accelerate regulatory decision-making.

TO21 is moving deeper into computational nanosafety — building the software infrastructure and predictive models that regulators and industry will need as nanomaterial registration requirements tighten globally.

How they like to work

TO21 operates exclusively as a consortium participant, never as a project coordinator — a pattern consistent with a specialised SME that contributes a defined technical capability rather than driving strategic direction. Their projects involve very large consortia (50 unique partners across 22 countries), meaning they are comfortable working in distributed, multinational research teams. As a Korean company in EU-funded research, they likely serve as a bridge bringing non-European regulatory perspectives, datasets, or software tools that complement European partners.

TO21 has built a remarkably wide network for a two-project participant — 50 unique partners across 22 countries, which reflects the large, international nature of the EU nanosafety consortia they joined. Their non-European base gives them an unusual position as one of very few Asian SMEs embedded in the EU nanomaterial research network.

What sets them apart

TO21 is one of very few Korean private companies with direct H2020 participation in nanosafety and nanoinformatics — a rare non-European voice in an otherwise EU- and US-dominated regulatory science field. For a consortium looking to build tools or datasets with global applicability, their Korean market and regulatory context is a genuine differentiator that European partners cannot replicate internally. Their combination of SME agility and specialised computational nanotoxicology expertise makes them a practical partner for tool development tasks that larger research institutes often handle too slowly.

Highlights from their portfolio

• NanoSolveIT
  A major EU nanosafety flagship (2019–2023) building an integrated nanoinformatics platform — TO21's involvement in the cloud platform and predictive modelling components signals genuine software or data science capability.
• ACEnano
  One of the foundational EU nanosafety projects establishing the characterisation standards that later informatics tools like NanoSolveIT depend on — participation here placed TO21 at the origin of the current EU nano risk assessment methodology.