CECA is overall ICIS Innovation Awards 2009 winner

19 October 2009 10:07  [Source: ICIS news]

LONDON (ICIS news)--The CECA division of France’s Arkema is the overall winner of the ICIS Innovation Awards for 2009, ICIS said on Monday.

The Awards, now in their sixth year, continue to be sponsored by Dow Corning as lead sponsor.

CECA’s entry, a novel surfactant formulation to reduce the environmental impact of preparing and laying asphalt road surfaces, also won the closely contested Best Product Innovation category, sponsored for the first time, by US-based consultancy CRA International.

In a year that attracted a record number of entries from around the globe, the five judges had a difficult task to select the category winners, said John Baker, global editor for custom publishing at ICIS and manager of the Awards.

“The quantity and quality of the entries confirm the Awards are growing in status”, he added. “With the number of sponsors increasing, we felt the time was right to nominate an overall winner for the first time this year.”

The winners in this year’s four categories are:

Best Product Innovation: CECA/Arkema (France) - Formulations for “greener roads”

Best Innovation by an SME: Oxford Catalysts/Velocys (UK/US) - A microchannel reactor for the distributed production of third-generation biofuels

Best Business Innovation: DSM (Netherlands) - Moving down the value chain with claryl - the picture glass

Best Innovation in Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR):Tata Chemicals (India) - Greening of alkaline and saline sediments.

Additionally, Lucite International (UK) was nominated for a special mention in the Best Product Innovation category for its development of Alpha technology for production of methylmethacrylate.

These five innovative entries were chosen as the best from the shortlist of 13 entrants, details of which were published earlier this year in the 3 August issue of ICIS Chemical Business.

Stephanie Burns, chairman, president and CEO of lead sponsor Dow Corning, noted: “Successful innovation takes courage. It requires a clear vision and a strategy. But more importantly it takes commitment and tenacity.

“The winners of these awards are proof of what can be achieved when a company makes innovation an integral element of its business and pursue that goal with steadfast determination and commitment.”

Neil Checker, vice president for chemicals at category sponsor CRA, added: “We are particularly encouraged by the unprecedented number of high quality submissions … a fact that reinforces our view that innovation remains vibrant in the chemical industry despite the current industry environment.”

Full details of the winning entries and interviews on innovation strategy with the two sponsors are published in the 19 October issue of ICIS Chemical Business. They can also be seen on tyhe ICIS Innovation Awards 2009 home page.

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By: John Baker
+44 20 8652 3214

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