TWIST Talk Roland Kalb (proionic GmbH): A Startup Journey from a Greek Beach towards World Leadership in Manufacture of Ionic Liquids
Ionic liquids are molten organic salts with very low melting points. They are a new class of liquid high tech materials with extraordinary properties, some of which usually found only in solid matter. By the end of 2018 more than 80.000 scientific papers were published and 17.000 patent families were applied in the field of ionic liquids, which went through a typical hype cycle. Based on their remarkable properties Ionic liquids allow fundamentally new approaches to technical challenges: They have the potential to open doors to radical innovations and clearly develop towards mass applications.
Roland Kalb was born in 1967 in Austria and is working in the field of technical ionic liquid application and manufacture since 19 years. In 2003 he invented an industrial process for the world’s first halide and waste free production of ultra-pure ionic liquids (CBILS®-process). He founded proionic GmbH in 2004, which today is one of the three leading companies in development and manufacturing of ionic liquids worldwide. Roland Kalb holds a number of more than 100 pending or issued patents and is an advisory board member at the DOE Joint BioEnergy Institute, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, California; several of his inventions are commercialized today.
Roland Kalb will give an insight into the fascinating world of ionic liquid applications, tell the story of what it means to build up a technology company and why society urgently needs to rethink the value of applied scientific entrepreneurship.