RE:RE:RE:Just given a head's up on this Quoted from the story in Hamilton Business
-Now the company is poised to grow again – this time because van Leeuwen said they believe they have a sound alternative to the use of formaldehyde in insulation and wood products.
The next likely product line will be in a biobased chemical that replaces formaldehyde — a chemical used currently in the production of insulation and wood panel products. Regulations for the use of formaldehyde are expected to become far more stringent over the next decade, which will force manufacturers, retailers and consumers to look for alternative solutions. Van Leeuwen said he thinks EcoSynthetix’s product is that alternative.
“We have a replacement that costs about the same so we see that as a huge global market for us,” he said. “Our vision is to be a large supplier of biobased materials in a variety of industries.”
That takes a mammoth R&D effort. The company has solved that through an innovative partnership agreement with the University of Waterloo, McMaster University, University of Toronto and University of Ottawa in which professors and grad students work on fundamental research while EcoSynthetix works on the applied research. The company gets the right to patent before a paper is published.
“A lot of big companies don’t do this,” said van Leeuwen. “This is just a great way to drive innovation and then once the students have graduated we can hire them.”