with 🎙️ Alex Rappaport, CEO and Co-Founder of ZwitterCo.  

💧 ZwitterCo leverages the benefits of Zwitterions to build Membranes that treat the world's toughest wastewater.

What we covered:

⚛️ How ZwitterCo's unique leverage of zwitterions overcomes membranes' greatest weakness: fouling 

🚀 How Alex Rappaport built a record-breaking membrane scale-up somewhat against the odds and how ZwitterCo was founded 

📅 How improving membranes and wastewater treatment was on the founding team's agenda from Day 1 and how they executed on it 

🦸 How ZwitterCo leveraged the SuperFiltration category to depict the unique properties of their wastewater membrane 

💡 How Water Scarcity and its increased awareness in industrial circles create a massive opportunity for the right set of technologies to address it 

🚚 How ZwitterCo defined its scope of deliveries and how the company decided for the best-suited Go-To Market Route 

🙌 How Alex's company just raised a record-breaking Series A and what this will unlock 

🌱 How the real impact ZwitterCo is aiming for goes beyond numbers - even if we are talking unicorn potential 

🇩🇪 What "Zwitter" actually means, how zwitterions are special animals, extending the range, leveraging real-world cases and feedback

🔥 ... and of course, we concluded with the 𝙧𝙖𝙥𝙞𝙙 𝙛𝙞𝙧𝙚 𝙦𝙪𝙚𝙨𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣𝙨 🔥

➡️ Join me (and many others!) at the BlueTech Forum

Get a 20% discount on checkout by using the code ANTOINE20

👋 See you in Edinburgh!

🔗 Check ZwitterCo's Website 

🔗 Send your warmest regards to Alex on LinkedIn

➡️ Check out the entire article on ZwitterCo's leverage of Zwitterions and how it could revolutionize the World of industrial wastewater treatment, including an infographic and a full transcript on the (don't) Waste Water website!

Alex Rappaport is the CEO and Co-Founder of ZwitterCo. ZwitterCo leverages the benefits of Zwitterions to build Membranes that treat the world's toughest wastewater.

Theoretically speaking, wastewater treatment is easy. You have water with stuff inside at the inlet, and you want water with much less stuff inside at the outlet. So you just have to define what has to be removed, and you could size a membrane to do exactly that job.

Let's say, you want everything that's larger than 1 nanometer to be out of the picture. You take a reverse osmosis membrane, you push your wastewater on one end, and whatever comes out on the other end will fit your specification. Easy, the job's done, goodbye!

Well... The problem is that if that system was to work, it would for sure not work long. Your membrane would be clogged, and irreversibly fouled, and after minutes to hours, you would have to throw it away and start fresh.

Now, nobody except me would be stupid enough to try something like that out. So in most cases, you won't go for a one-step treatment; you'll rather opt for a clever combination, where stuff gets removed from water layer by layer with optimized efficiency. 

Stages of this process will probably be done with membranes, and if you want to end up reusing that water, the last step will for sure be done with membranes.

But even if you have this time designed everything right, your membranes will still clog over time, and backwash will lose efficiency cycle after cycle until irreversible fouling is so high you have to replace your system.

So, every 7 to 12 years, you're good to reinvest in membranes, modules, and some peripherals. Unless someone cracks the code for fouling-free membranes... But that's physically not possible, right?

Well, that's before looking into the surprising physical properties of Zwitterions, a special family of molecules that are simultaneously positively and negatively charged. As a result, they're highly hydrophilic and very resistant to non-specific adhesion. 

So wouldn't that make them the best special sauce to pump up a membrane filtration system? I'll let Alex answer this in a minute, as he'll do it so much better than me. 

But you'll swiftly notice that it's a fascinating take at the toughest wastewaters and most difficult industrial reuse riddles.

To that extent, ZwitterCo is a perfect example of innovation with impact. If that's a theme you'd like to explore in greater depth, Innovation with Impact is also the tagline of the upcoming BlueTech Forum, happening in Edinburgh on the 17th and 18th of May. The agenda is packed with great speakers, mastermind roundtable sessions, "innovation for impact" box design sprints, 5 by 5 partnership case studies, lots of networking opportunities, and BlueTech's signature cherry-picked disruptive water tech innovations. 

That's just a bite-sized summary of a packed agenda - if you'd like to know more, check out bluetechforum.com - and consider joining me and many former guests of this podcast in Edinburgh this May. I talked of cherry-picked innovation: well there's a cherry on the cake as well: with the code Antoine20, like my name, 20, you'll get a 20% discount on your registration if you book before the end of April.

➡️ Join me (and many others!) at the BlueTech Forum

Get a 20% discount on checkout by using the code ANTOINE20

👋 See you in Edinburgh!

➡️ Check out the entire article on ZwitterCo's leverage of Zwitterions and how it could revolutionize the World of industrial wastewater treatment, including an infographic and a full transcript on the (don't) Waste Water website!

Join me (and many others!) at the BlueTech Forum ➡️ https://www.bluetechforum.com/

Get a 20% discount on checkout by using the code ANTOINE20

👋 See you in Edinburgh!

***

Over the past five years:

- NX Filtration lost $28.56 million

- De.Mem burned $12.14 million

- CleanTeq Water was $18.63 million in the red 

- Aquaporin lost... $67.1 million!

Yet, I'll dare to say I think those four companies are on the right track!

Why? Let's explore.

Then, there's one more company that's lost $39 million over that same period of time, for which I'd be much more worried. Who's that? I'll reveal in the last segment!

00:00 Introduction

00:07 Aquaporin, NX Filtration, De.Mem and CleanTeq Water are bleeding money

00:53 Membrane Companies are "Special Beasts"

02:19 What is disruptive in the Membrane World? 

04:30 What are these Membrane Companies investing their money on?

05:44 Is increased Water Scarcity the path to Profit for these companies?

06:58 Join me at the BlueTech Forum 2023!

07:50 This company is in BIG TROUBLE

09:16 Conclusion

The Ultimate Guide of Membrane Filtration: https://youtu.be/RUpiL_x7680

Graeme Pearce tells us the full story of Membrane Filtration: https://dww.show/everything-you-always-wanted-to-know-about-mbrs-without-daring-to-ask/

Andrew Benedek adds up the story of MBRs: https://dww.show/how-to-be-alone-early-crazy-but-actually-right-the-history-of-zenon/

▶️ Watch the video version of this episode on YouTube   

with 🎙️ Björn Otto, founder, and Managing Director of Interius Solutions. 

💧 Interius Solutions supports Water Technology Companies with outsourced marketing solutions and a very special touch - it's marketing done by water professionals that understand water technologies. 

Marketing is not the Water Industry's forte. I dare you to find one out of the 187 previous episodes of this podcast in which we don't at least allude to the flaws in our sector's marketing. 

We've discussed how it impacts water's value, water's perception, water technology's take-off and market adoption, the general public's understanding of our sector, how it inhibits the fight against water scarcity, how it opens boulevards for bottled water or unsustainable practices and much more and much worse.

But, once we've said all that. What do we do about it?

Sitting on our hands and complaining is not really in the DNA of this sector, so it's about time we apply this forward thinking to marketing as well. That requires some know-how, some understanding of the root causes of the situation we're in, a ton of expertise, and, more important: practical, concrete, and actionable pieces of advice. 

That is why I reached out to my co-host on the Water Show, Björn Otto, and gave him this simple task. Provide water industry decision-makers, investors, and key actors with a blueprint for action. And god, did he deliver on the request! So without further due, I'll let you dive into my discussion with him.

Last stop before that - if you like today's content, consider subscribing and sharing that episode with your boss, a colleague, your marketing manager or that promising young engineer in your team you'd think would make an incredible marketer going forward

🔥 ... and of course, we concluded with the 𝙧𝙖𝙥𝙞𝙙 𝙛𝙞𝙧𝙚 𝙦𝙪𝙚𝙨𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣𝙨 🔥

🔗 Send your warmest regards to Björn on LinkedIn    

🔗 Check out Interius Solution's solutions.com/">website  

▶️ Find the full article on why and how Water Companies shall Better their Marketing Game on the (don't) Waste Water website!

with 🎙️ Paul Gagliardo, Judge and advisor at Imagine H2O, and Principal at Gagliacqua.     

💧 Paul also runs the Water Entrepreneur, an incredibly good water podcast that is one of my personal favorites and which also turns out to be a family business as Paul will elaborate on later on in the conversation.

What we covered:

🚽 How leading the project that infamously popularized the term "toilet to tap" made Paul famous and what his job was in San Diego 

👨‍🔬 How Paul led a research center that tested equipment, gave a brutally honest feedback and assessment and how he rapidly got praised for that 

🈂️ How becoming a consultant engineer, one of his first duties was to translate what utilities said so that his colleagues could understand it 

🏰 How the water sector used to be extremely conservative and somewhat trapped in the 19th century and how things drastically changed over the last decade 

🧑 How the startup founder is almost as important as the technology and the market the company aims for, why, and what to do now that you're aware of that 

🚧 How some inventors believe in their technology despite the fundamental laws of physics and how to overcome their harassing demands 

⚖️ Defining a set of rules to check and assess technology in the most effective manner and how despite all precautions taken to make it a science, there is still some subjectivity in it 

🧑‍⚖️ How the more disruptive your technology is, the more people will want to compare it to things they know and understand to better assess the value you're delivering 

📊 How you need to think of data collection from the onset when piloting and how there are a set of best practices that support your efforts in this endeavor 

🤌 How expertise can be tricky: the more expertise someone has, the less likely that person is to look at something new because they think they already know everything 

0️⃣ Startups having zero experience in the water business, getting paid as a utility and having to figure out what to do with the money, how founders have to be prepared to be replaced when the company grows, being an open book, being smarter than everybody else, seeing the future... and much more! 

🔥 ... and of course, we concluded with the 𝙧𝙖𝙥𝙞𝙙 𝙛𝙞𝙧𝙚 𝙦𝙪𝙚𝙨𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣𝙨 🔥 

🔗 Send your warmest regards to Paul on LinkedIn  

🔗 Check out the Water Entrepreneur Podcast's Website

🔗 Find the full transcript of my conversation with the inventor of the Toilet to Tap on the (don't) Waste Water website!

Paul Gagliardo is a judge and advisor at Imagine H2O, and the Principal of a consultancy dedicated to developing water start-ups, Gagliacqua. If you're into podcasts, and I hope you are as you're listening to this, Paul also runs the Water Entrepreneur, an incredibly good water podcast that is one of my personal favorites and which also turns out to be a family business as Paul will elaborate on later on in the conversation.

The path to success for a Water Start-Up is often everything but a straight line. It takes time, patience, effort, grit, passion, and a lot more to take a water company from zero to one, one to ten, ten to one thousand, and one thousand to one million.

And we've covered some of the emblematic examples of that long road on that microphone, for instance, with Andrew Benedek, who told us how he maybe took Zenon from the lonely prophet in the middle of the desert to the leader of the MBR revolution, but in no less than two decades.

Now, what Paul brings into the discussion today, as you already heard in the extracts, is that the Water Sector is evolving. It doesn't get easier, but it goes at a faster pace. And interestingly, the turning point that started that acceleration coincides with the inception of Imagine H2O - a story we've covered with Scott Bryan on that microphone, and in which Paul is an important actor. 

This new age of breaking things fast and striving for swifter impact materializes in many shapes. For instance, the financial results recently published by the new cool kids on the block in the Water Industry show that the money-burning path to scale, once reserved for the Uber, Twitter, or WeWork of this World, now also applies to the Water Sector. To take only one example.

With a faster pace also comes greater uncertainty and increased importance in making the right decision at the right time. This is where profiles like Paul's are an incredible resource: having been on all ends of the Water Spectrum, they've gathered experience that can prove invaluable to the C-suite and founders of these scale-ups. To that extent, you'll see that today's conversation doubles down and enhances on concepts we've heard from Wayne Byrne, Graeme Pearce, Reinhard Hübner, or Piers Clark. 

In conclusion to this lengthy introduction, I can tell you that I enjoyed spending that hour with Paul, that I hope you will as well, and that if that's the case, I'd strongly encourage you to take this podcast and share it with a friend, a colleague, a start-up founder or an investor! So please do it, and I'll meet you on the other side. 

Over the weekend, a series of violent riots took place in Sainte Soline in the Western part of France.

The reason for it is a water storage project that has raised contestation for several months now.

Is it the first consequence of rising Water Scarcity?

🎙️ PODCAST 🎙️

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689 Registered Commitments!

That's an impressive call to action that comes out of the #UNWaterConference in New York this week.

Sure, there were the usual shenanigans we saw on Days 1 & 2, but still, the various commissions delivered impressive outputs.

And yes, a special envoy for Water will be appointed. So here's the next question: who will it be?

Here's the summary:

00:00 Introduction

00:15 Number of the day: 689!

00:48 Key Outcomes of the UN Water Conference

02:35 The Transboundary Water Bromance in South America

03:59 More water commitments by the Interactive Dialog Groups

04:34 Who did it better: young or old speakers?

06:18 Third series of Water Commitments

07:45 A New UN Water Envoy... and Beyond?

09:09 How to Leverage the UN Water Conference

09:44 Conclusion

➡️ Check out my entire collection of SDG 6 topics on the (don't) Waste Water website!

The UN Water Conference keeps advancing in New York, with this second day and a new series of plenary sessions with many country statements.

What's to remember from today? Here's the recap.

00:00 Introduction

00:22 Sentence of the Day: László Borbély, Romania

00:47 Learning 3 - Are we ambitious enough with #SDG6?

02:02 Learning 2 - PPPs have their role to play!

03:36 Learning 1 - We learn more about the UN Special Envoy for Water!

06:20 Daily Zapping

07:26 Flop 3 - Are UN attendees bad pupils?

08:16 Flop 2 - Water and War(s) Ukraine, Karabagh...

11:42 Flop 1 - Are UN Statements boring?

14:29 Conclusion

➡️ Check out my entire collection of SDG 6 topics on the (don't) Waste Water website!

The UN Water Conference started on the 22 of March in New York. For the first time since Mar Del Plata in 1977, the Water Topic gets the largest possible exposure to solve this riddle: how can we finally ensure that SDG 6 is reached? That everybody receives access to safe drinking water and wastewater management?

On Day 1, there were many very generic statements and some things to extract, which I did for you. 8 hours of plenary conferences condenses in under 15 minutes, a challenge? Yes. A stretch? Sure!

But I did it, and here's what's inside:

00:00 Introduction

00:14 The Key Sentence

02:08 Top 3 Highlights of Day 1

07:51 Zapping - Good Words and High-End Sequences

10:00 Flop 3 - the Awkward moments

12:57 Conclusion

➡️ Check out my entire collection of SDG 6 topics on the (don't) Waste Water website!