Who wins the motan innovation award (MIA) 2018?

motan innovation award: Trophy of the motan innovation award (Image credit: motan) / motan innovation award: The trophy of the motan innovation award (Picture: motan)

The six MIA nominees and motan CEO Sandra Füllsack. From left to right: Philipp Mählmeyer, Peter Haupt, Sandra Füllsack, Bernd Michael, Karl Wolfgang, Stefan Endres, and Reinhard Herro. (Image credit: motan group)

The countdown is on: The six mia finalists presented their plastic innovations in July before an independent expert jury and are now eagerly awaiting whether they will make it onto the winners' podium. The four-member panel of experts from universities and institutes in the field of plastics research has already made a decision after careful review of the project ideas behind closed doors. However, the official announcement of the winners will only take place in the fall: The motan innovation award will be presented on October 18, 2018, during FAKUMA at the Dornier Museum in Friedrichshafen.

The first award ceremony of the mia award took place nearly two years ago at K`2016 in Düsseldorf. At that time, four clever ideas managed to convince the jury. Two of the awarded innovations also passed all practical tests and were successfully further developed. In 2018, motan holding gmbh again aims to make good ideas future-proof and to advance the projects of the future mia winners. The winners will receive, in addition to a cash prize, support with patent applications and the development of their own invention up to market maturity. But patience is still required: Only the jury knows who will take the top three places and how the prize money of 20,000 euros will be distributed at the moment.

The mia nominees (in alphabetical order)

Stefan Endres
Project idea: Adaptive central vacuum control; Goal: More efficient plant utilization and higher production safety

Peter Haupt
Project idea: Regulated conveying of bulk goods; Goal: Measure speed and optimize conveying processes

Reinhard Hierro
Project idea: GAK system (Gravimetric suction hopper); Goal: Automation, control, and monitoring of suction conveying systems

Philipp Mählmeyer
Project idea: Plant control on mobile device; Goal: Targeted retrieval of status information via QR codes

Bernd Michael
Project idea: System METRO-Lay; Goal: Efficient creation of trenches for material and vacuum lines

Karl Wolfgang
Project idea: Repeater; Goal: Gentle material conveying in the vacuum area

The mia jury

Prof. Dr. Martin Bastian has been leading the SKZ in Würzburg as director since 2006, which is Germany's largest plastics institute.

Dr.-Ing. Peter Faatz was a professor of plastics engineering and has been heading process development for plastics engineering at INA Schaeffler's plant since 2005.

Karl Miller started in 1987 as a Technical Sales Engineer at Colortronic and now leads motan-colortronic Ltd. in Great Britain.

Prof. Dr.-Ing. Christian Hopmann has been head of the Institute for Plastics Processing (IKV) in Industry and Handcraft at RWTH Aachen since April 2011.

The essentials of the motan innovation award (mia) at a glance

Ideas nominated are those that…

- solve customer-specific problems.
- integrate new technologies into existing applications.
- explore new application possibilities for existing products and solutions.
- conserve resources, whether on motan devices or on the part of plastics manufacturers and processors.
- increase user-friendliness and service friendliness.
- enable new business models.

Award ceremony:

During FAKUMA on October 18, 2018, at the Dornier Museum Friedrichshafen.

Prize money:

The prize money of 20,000 euros will be distributed among up to three winners. The distribution among the finalists is decided by the jury.