PlasmaBound and NovaUCD Win Future Forward Impact Award at 2022 Knowledge Transfer Ireland Awards
PlasmaBound and University College Dublin (UCD), through NovaUCD, have been announced as the winner of the Future Forward Impact Award at the 2022 Knowledge Transfer Ireland (KTI) Impact Awards. Now in their 9th year, these Awards celebrate the work of the Higher Education Innovation Offices around the country, and their role in helping transform academic research into commercial impact.
The Future Forward Impact Award, which was won by PlasmaBound and NovaUCD, recognises knowledge transfer activities that have strong potential for future impact but may still be at the early stages of development or roll out.
PlasmaBound, a UCD engineering spin-out, has developed a ground-breaking, environmentally friendly, lightweight composite bonding technology, Controlled Polymer Ablation (CPA), that poses real potential as a key solution in advanced manufacturing. The CPA technology, which is attracting significant interest in several sectors, is set to bring about a step-change in manufacturing as it not only protects the environment, reduces waste and energy consumption but also eliminates the need for manual interventions.
PlasmaBound, headquartered at NovaUCD, was co-founded in 2017 by Dr James Nicholas Barry, Alan Barry and Xavier Montibert as a spin-out from the UCD College of Engineering and Architecture.
Since then PlasmaBound has grown to team of 15 employees, become an approved supplier for the European Space Agency and is currently undertaking validation trials with 30 Tier 1 global companies across different industry sectors.
Alan Barry, CEO and co-founder, PlasmaBound said, “We are thrilled to have won the Future Forward Impact Award, which recognises the future potential of our technology, at this year’s KTI Impact Awards, along with the NovaUCD which has strongly supported the development of the company over many years. Our technology focus is about getting more renewable, lightweight materials into mainstream use faster which we believe will have a significant impact on achieving a more sustainable carbon-reduced future.”
Dr Imelda Lambkin, Enterprise Ireland, Dr Hugh Hayden, NovaUCD and Dr Nick Barry, PlasmaBound
Tom Flanagan, UCD Director of Enterprise and Commercialisation, said, “I am delighted that UCD has won the Future Forward Impact Award with PlasmaBound at the 2022 KTI Impact Awards. This Award recognises the strong potential for future impact of PlasmaBound and is an indication of the quality of the spin-outs emerging from UCD research activities with the support of NovaUCD.”
“PlasmaBound’s CPA technology has the potential to deliver significant international impact in terms of sustainability and carbon reduction benefits in many different industry sectors, and the NovaUCD team looks forward to continue supporting PlasmaBound as it continues scale to achieve its global ambitions in the years ahead.”
The company has also raised €3.45 million in funding to date from Act Venture Capital, Atlantic Bridge University Fund, Enterprise Ireland and a number of private investors.
Minister of State for Trade Promotion, Digital and Company Regulation, Dara Calleary TD said, “Congratulations to all the winners on what is further evidence of a thriving ecosystem of collaboration between industry and publicly funded research. With solutions to address immediate health, social and environmental concerns it is very welcome to see both revenue and job creation as a result of public-funded research commercialisation and collaboration. Companies that are active in research, development and innovation are shown to perform better than their peers, and I would encourage businesses to consider collaboration with public research as a means to enhance their offering.”
Imelda Lambkin, Manager, Disruptive Technologies, Innovation and Knowledge Transfer, Enterprise Ireland and Chair of the KTI Awards judging panel, said, “Firstly, it was most welcome to be back to an in-person event following virtual ceremonies in 2021 and 2020.”
“The quality of collaboration between businesses and publicly-funded research continues to improve year on year and the calibre of award entries reflect this, making 2022 a challenging one for the judging panel. It is important to pay particular credit to the work of the technology transfer offices around the country who provide the vital link and support structure so knowledge transfer can deliver meaningful outcomes to society. The teams in these offices around the country are key to the successes being celebrated by the KTI Impact Awards.”
The shortlisted entries for the 2022 KTI Awards were evaluated by a panel of international experts that included; Declan O’Mahoney, entrepreneur-in-residence at the Tyndall National Institute; Elaine Berkery, Director at Eastway Tech; Almesha Campbell, Assistant Vice-President for Research and Economic Development at Jackson State University; Tim Conlon, Head of Policy and Strategic Planning, International Programmes & Gender Equality at the Higher Education Authority; Christophe Haunold, Head of Partnership, Knowledge and Technology Transfer Office at the University of Luxembourg; and Sue Sundstrom, Director of the Praxis Auril Fundamentals of Technology Transfer program in the UK.
Further information on Awards and the 2022 winners is available via https://www.knowledgetransferireland.com/Events/KTI-Impact-Awards/KTI-Impact-Awards-2022/Finalists-and-Winners/
ENDS
2 December 2022
For further information contact Micéal Whelan, Communications and Media Relations Manager, UCD Research and Innovation, NovaUCD, e: miceal.whelan@ucd.ie.
Editors Notes
Knowledge Transfer Ireland (KTI) makes it simpler for business and research performing organisations to work together. KTI aims to maximise the extent to which State-funded technology, ideas and expertise gets into the hands of business to drive innovation. KTI is located in Enterprise Ireland and funded by Enterprise Ireland with co-financing from the Irish Universities Association. www.knowledgetransferireland.com
PlasmaBound’s goal is to enable industry to employ composite materials in lightweight vehicles, products and structures, as standard, at all price points. https://plasmabound.com
The UCD Knowledge Transfer team, based at NovaUCD, through its extensive commercial experience and drawing on its network of industry experts, patent agents and legal experts, supports UCD researchers to commercially exploit their research outputs for the benefit of the University and the wider community. www.novaucd.ie