Ecovative Returns to World Economic Forum
For release: Disruptive Mushroom Material Company Returns to the 2013 World Economic Forum GREEN ISLAND, NY, Monday, January 21, 2013 - Eben Bayer, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Ecovative Design LLC will be attending The World Economic Forum meeting in Davos Kloster, Switzerland on January 23rd through 26th. Ecovative was named a Technology Pioneer by the forum in 2011, and this will be Ecovative’s third time at the prestigious event. The World Economic Forum names Technology Pioneers to recognize extraordinary new ventures that have potential to transform industries and change the world. By inviting these Pioneers to Davos, they help connect the current economic leaders with some of the most exciting new technologies and companies in the world. At this year’s event, Bayer will speak in a session titled “The Global Design Challenge” which asks the question, “What are the grand challenges for design in the 21st century?” This session will cover: creating a sustainable future, closing the poverty gap, understanding and managing complexity, and responding to rapid urbanization. Joining him on this panel will be: Tim Berners-Lee, Director of the World Wide Web Foundation, Xin Zhang, CEO and Co-Founder of SOHO China Limited, and Paola Antonelli, Senior Curator of the Department of Architecture and Design at the Museum of Modern Art. Bayer will share his thoughts on the out of the ordinary thinking and strategies that has lead to Ecovative’s radical innovations and products that are changing markets. At the 2011 meeting, Bayer met Ryan Flannigan, President of Protective Packing at Sealed Air Corporation, today an 8 billion USD company. There, he introduced him to Mushroom® Packaging, a new, disruptive, replacement to foams like expanded polystyrene (EPS). Mushroom® Packaging is competitive with EPS on performance and cost, and is also renewable, biobased and home compostable. One year later, at the 2012 meeting, Bayer and Bill Hickey, the CEO and Chairman, signed an agreement for Sealed Air to License Mushroom® Packaging technology in North America. Sealed Air is now marketing, selling and distributing Restore™ Mushroom® Packaging across North America. Ecovative is presently getting ready to launch Mushroom® Packaging internationally, with a focus on Asia. As the world’s hub of manufacturing, Asia represents the largest market for protective packaging. It is a region where many current Mushroom® Packaging customers do the majority of their packaging, and there is a strong demand for worldwide availability. Ecovative will partner with qualified companies in Asia to accelerate adoption of Mushroom® Packaging. In addition to protective packaging, Ecovative’s Mushroom Material technology has far reaching possibilities for a variety of markets. Over the next two years, Ecovative has plans to launch Mushroom Materials in several markets including building materials, automotive, apparel, and furniture. Recent material advances have yielded a variety of impressive properties, including class A fire resistance, high levels of water absorption, extreme hydrophobicity, superior resilience, reduced density, and major improvements in strength. These materials are all based on Ecovative’s platform of renewable, biobased, biocompatible, environmentally responsible materials. Ecovative is continuing to develop these capabilities and is assessing the most promising markets to launch these materials and leverage their game-changing properties. Ecovative will partner with industry leaders in situations where market adoption can be rapidly accelerated. Eben Bayer will be blogging live or shortly after his trip on several popular websites to be announced soon on Ecovative’s website and twitter feed. Bayer will be writing about Ecovative, design and his experiences at the World Economic Forum.About Ecovative Founded in 2007, Ecovative is a materials science company developing a new class of home-compostable plastics based on mycelium, an organism akin to a living polymer. Ecovative’s high-performance products serve as environmentally responsible alternatives to traditional foam packaging, insulation, and other plastic-based materials. Ecovative was incubated at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Rensselaer, together with 3M Company and the DOEN Foundation, are significant investors in Ecovative. Ecovative has been recognized with numerous international awards for sustainability and “green” technologies, and was named a Tech Pioneer at the 2011 World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Ecovative’s growth has been fueled by grants, prizes, and support from key partners including the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, the National Science Foundation, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the National Collegiate Inventors and Innovators Alliance. For more information, visit www.ecovativedesign.com
