Spinnova has announced Mr Juha Salmela, Chief Technology Officer, co-founder and inventor of the sustainable fiber innovation as Europe’s CTO of the year 2018.
This award is given each year to the most inspiring and prominent technology leaders who are innovation forerunners. They are awarded by the European Industrial Research Management Association together with innovation consulting company Spinverse. The CTO of the Year Europe 2018 winners were announced in the EU Industry Days event in Brussels today. Belgian Dr. Nicolas Cudré-Mauroux from the chemical company Solvay won the large company series, whereas Mr Salmela won the small and medium size company series. Both CTOs and their companies focus on using technology in an innovative way to promote sustainability.
Mr Salmela invented spinning textile fiber out of micro-fibrillated cellulose without harmful chemicals in 2009, with inspiration from spider silk research. He and Spinnova’s expert team have scaled the innovation from a laboratory scale into a large industrial pilot in just four years, with a technology concept invented by Mr Salmela.
Mr Salmela’s main focus was on experimental research of paper making related fiber suspension flows and rheology. Mr Salmela has also led several large industrial process development projects in his 18 years with the VTT.
