SOLAGRO

The chemistry is covered. The rest we are building

SolaGro comes out of the School of Physical and Chemical Sciences at North-West University in Potchefstroom, South Africa.

The science is the work of a group that has been doing surfactant and polymer chemistry together for years.

Science

Dr Frans Smit

Dr Frans Smit

Co-founder and lead scientist

Inventor of the luminescent surfactant family the technology rests on. PhD in pharmaceutical chemistry, Senior Lecturer at North-West University.

Background in medicinal, pharmaceutical and organic chemistry and a recent focus on surfactant science. Holder of an NRF Scarce Skills Postdoctoral Grant and an NWU Innovation Fellowship.

Built and ran his own company while completing his doctorate.

Prof. Hermanus Vosloo

Prof. Hermanus Vosloo

Catalysis

Professor of Chemistry at North-West University since 2004 and former director of its Chemical Resource Beneficiation research focus area.

A leading authority on homogeneous catalysis, particularly catalysed reactions of unsaturated hydrocarbons, with six granted patents and a long record of industrial research with partners including AECI and SASOL.

Fellow of the South African Chemical Institute, past chair of the Catalysis Society of South Africa, and a member of the international advisory board of the Symposium on Olefin Metathesis.

Prof. Daniel Otto

Prof. Daniel Otto

Polymer science and NMR

Polymer integration and nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. NRF-rated, with a research background in drug delivery, polyelectrolytes and colloids.

Named on the luminescent-surfactant international patent filings, and responsible for how the actives behave once they are inside the matrix.

Runs vocational NMR training for visiting masters students from Aalen University in Germany, several cohorts of which have worked on surfactant characterisation.

Dr Ettiene Wiese

Dr Ettiene Wiese

Synthesis and analytics

PhD in chemistry on the synthesis of linear and Guerbet-type amino acid surfactants and the determination of their physicochemical properties, which is the compound family the technology rests on.

Responsible for the multi-step synthetic routes and the analytical work that characterises them: NMR, tensiometry, FTIR, GC-MS, HPLC, UV-visible and fluorescence spectroscopy.

Commercial

Michael Rivers

Michael Rivers

Co-founder, business development lead and intended CCO

Thirty-five years in strategy, technology and innovation performance, including a decade translating South African national science policy into delivery programmes across information technology, water, waste, solar energy, energy storage and agriculture.

Has worked on SolaGro for more than two years, leading commercialisation and funding, building the financial model, and contributing substantially to the Technology Innovation Agency application, without remuneration.

We are open about the gap, and it is not commercial leadership. What we do not yet have is specialist capacity in OEM and materials licensing, module qualification, and industrial manufacturing at scale.

Those are the disciplines that take a material from a validated prototype into a production line, and they are the disciplines we are looking for in a partner as much as in a hire.

Institution

The intellectual property arose from publicly financed research and is owned by North-West University under South Africa's Intellectual Property Rights from Publicly Financed Research and Development Act.

The company is not yet incorporated. The intended structure is the ordinary shape of a South African university spinout: the intellectual property remains with the university, and the company would hold it under licence on terms to be agreed with NWU.

Get in touch

For partnership, licensing or validation enquiries.