Four students from the University of Arkansas have launched a startup company around technology developed by U of M biochemist Simo Sarkanen, Department of Bioproducts and Biosystems Engineering, that would manufacture biodegradable plastic shopping bags. The founders formed cycleWood Solutions Inc. after creating a business plan around the technology for an entrepreneurship class.
“The point of the class was to build a viable business,” said Nhiem Cao, president and CEO of cycleWood Solutions. He found the technology, a lignin-based biodegradable plastic, on the Office for Technology Commercialization’s website. They then completed an option agreement for the technology, and later licensed it to launch the startup.
According to Cao, one million plastic bags are used globally every minute. Some discarded bags will sit forever in landfills, some will pollute the world’s oceans and landscapes as litter and less than one percent will be recycled. Cao hopes cycleWood will be part of the solution to this problem.