The solar energy industry is experiencing rapid growth and innovation, and machine learning is playing a key role in driving this trend. Solar energy plays a crucial role in the sustainability initiative providing a clean, renewable, and cost-effective source of power. The adoption of solar energy usage can help to address climate change, improve energy security, and provide access to electricity in remote areas. This growth is fueled by the increasing adoption of machine learning and artificial intelligence technologies, which are helping organisations in the solar energy industry to more accurately predict and optimise the performance of their solar panels. These models can effectively analyse images of solar panels to detect and diagnose issues such as microcracks, “snail trails”, broken glass, hot spots, dust build-up and other defects that may impact their performance. Building and deploying these models can be a complex process, requiring the use of multiple tools and a high level of technical expertise. This technology offer is a customisable end-to-end MLOps platform that is capable of streamlining the process and makes it easier for teams to build custom computer vision models specifically for solar energy monitoring and optimisation. With this platform, teams can quickly and easily convert their data into working models with enterprise-standard practices, ensuring the accuracy and reliability of their solar energy monitoring systems. The technology owner is keen to do R&D collaboration with organisations looking to improve and optimise the overall design and integration of solar energy systems.  

Bioplastics have gained significant attention due to the environmental issues of fossil-based plastics and the realisation of limited petroleum resources. On the other side, industrial and agricultural organic wastes are produced in huge quantities worldwide, resulting in serious environmental and economic impacts. To solve the above problems, the technology owner has developed a 100% natural biotechnological process to convert industrial and agricultural organic waste into bioplastics. Bioplastics are fully biodegradable and biocompatible, with no harm to humans and environment. These bioplastics are applicable to industrial plastic processes and potentailly replace conventional plastics in short lifespan applications. The use of industrial and agricultural waste as cheaper sources not only makes the production process more economic but also helps in the management of organic waste, contributing to the goal of a circular economy. This technology is available for IP licensing and R&D collaboration with industrial partners who are interested in the sustainable production of bioplastics using organic waste.

Traditional traceability technologies often rely on barcodes, QR codes, and holograms on external packaging. These methods are always more susceptible to both intentional and unintentional removal or tampering. This technology offer is a patented innovation that uses natural food ingredients as a unique bio barcode tag for identification. Tags can be added directly as a powder or liquid to products for batch tagging. The technology helps to prove compliance by offering tamper-proof assurance from raw material and hence improves the supply chain integrity by preventing counterfeiting, product dilution, and cross-contamination; at the same time, the tags protect brand value, and transparency as well as establish brand recognition. The technology provider is interested to do test-bedding with food ingredients companies, FMCG companies, agri-food growers, and trading companies who are concerning traceability in their value chain.

Catastrophic residential fires and wildfires have a significant impact in terms of fatalities, injuries, loss of property, and air pollution. Flame retardants play important roles in fire protection by helping to prevent or slow the spread of fire. Currently, brominated flame retardants (BFRs) are the most abundantly used flame retardants. However, there are increasing concerns about their toxicity to humans and persistence in the environment.  To find an eco-friendly alternative to those toxic chemicals, the technology owner has developed a non-toxic flame-retardant nanocoating using bio-based and renewable raw materials such as chitosan and clay nanoplatelets. This water-based coating can potentially be applied to any flammable polymeric material, such as wood, foams and fabrics, providing effective fire protection for a wide range of applications. The technology is available for IP licencing and R&D collaboration with industry partners who are interested in adopting flame-retardant coatings in their products and applications.

Seaweed or macroalgae are aquatic plants that anchor to hard surfaces to grow and are usually found on the ocean floor. Seaweed farming is the fastest growing sector within marine aquaculture with a global market worth of USD 15 billion in 2021 with a CAGR of 7.5% from 2021 to 2028. It is a versatile raw ingredient that can be applied to functional foods, animal feed, biomaterials, personal care products, fertilizers, nutraceuticals, and pharmaceuticals, and even serves as an environmental remediation method. Moreover, it is a carbon-negative crop that has a high potential for climate change mitigation through carbon capture. To go beyond farming at a smallholder scale, there is a need to look at farming at an industrial scale to meet the burgeoning demands in the global market. Based in Singapore, the technology seeker is a company in the aquaculture sector and they are seeking co-development partners to provide marine engineering expertise to develop a platform for industrial-scale offshore seaweed farming. Preferably, the tech provider should have experience in food production/farming systems on an industrial scale in coastal waters. Depending on the collaborators’ preference and further negotiations, the modes of partnership that could be considered include R&D collaboration, technology licensing, and IP acquisition. The technology seeker prefers technology owners with a presence and available technical professionals in Singapore to support this pilot project. Overseas-based technology owners would be considered as well on a case-by-case basis.

Fermentation is one of the oldest technologies used in food processing and the technology has been gaining limelight in recent years due to modern applications. With Singapore’s ’30 by 30’ goal to produce 30% of our nutritional needs locally and sustainably by 2030, and in line with consumer megatrends such as healthy (functional, natural) consumption and advocation for animal rights, fermentation technologies could help to address these issues. There is interest to seek out technology owners who have novel and proven fermentation technologies that can be used for the production of food and feed or to valorise food waste from side streams as low-cost feedstocks to manufacture value-added products as part of closing the food waste loop. These technologies should be available for technology collaborations. The modes of technology collaborations are: R&D collaboration, IP licensing and acquisition. Suitable technologies can be placed as Technology Offers on the IPI portal, subject to internal curation and review. 

A leading snack company is interested in novel leavening solutions (ingredient and/or process technologies) that enable effective sodium reduction for their baked goods portfolio (savory/salty crackers, sweet cookies). Sodium-based leavening agents (sodium bicarbonate, SAPP etc.) are commonly used in baked goods to deliver the desired product texture and appearance. Finding alternative solutions that can deliver the same great consumer experience without elevating the pH is of interest.