Canada-headed natural fiber composites developer INCA Renewtech Inc. (INCA) has recently "emerged" from stealth mode and announced that it has secured the land to build a large-scale manufacturing facility in Elkhart County, Indiana (IN) in the United States (US) that will process thousands of tonnes of hemp fiber into high-performance biocomposite panels and pellets for the transportation, consumer plastics, and building materials industries.
The company also announced that it has reached an exclusive sales agreement with US-based Genesis Products Inc, which provides design and engineering, advanced materials expertise, and manufacturing facilities to Fortune 200 companies in the RV, building materials, transportation, and furniture industries.
We’ve built a team with decades of proven experience delivering natural fiber composites to the automotive industry along with deep expertise in plant genomics, fiber processing, and hemp cultivation. We have the capability, the proven track record, and the proprietary technology to solve some of the most complex material and performance challenges of our time including replacement of glass-reinforced plastics and plywood and achieving carbon neutrality, said David Saltman, Chairman and CEO of INCA.
INCA BioPanels are initially intended to replace the plywood currently being used in RV and truck trailer construction.
Our company has long awaited a composite panel product that can reduce vehicle weight, increase strength and safety, improve thermal and acoustic properties and reduce impact on the environment. Our new partnership with INCA Renewtech further powers our ability to incorporate best-in-class materials into our engineered solutions for our customers, said Jon Wenger, CEO of Genesis Products.
INCA BioPanels will have applications in the furniture and flooring industries, as well as Hollywood movie sets. The company is also developing proprietary formulations for the automotive and consumer plastics industries.
INCA BioPlastics compounded pellets will enable manufacturers to substitute a bio-based solution for glass-reinforced plastics (GRP), without significant modification to their manufacturing lines.
INCA’s President and CTO, Garry Balthes has decades of expertise developing composite solutions for GM, Mercedes, John Deere, Caterpillar, Toyota North America, Ford, Chrysler, Honda, Nissan, Volkswagen, Cirrus Aircraft, and many other automotive and non-automotive companies.
In 1997, Balthes co-founded Flexform Technologies with Saltman and created the technology to manufacture the first North American plant-based natural fiber composites– now in millions of cars, trucks, utility equipment, and sports aircraft. In 2015 he designed and built the world’s most advanced non-woven biocomposites factory for Carver.
Throughout my career, I have focused on solving the most complex materials challenges in the transportation industry – particularly in the bio-composites field. Now so much more innovation is possible thanks to our proprietary technology and the expertise of our team. We’re going to make natural fiber composites a mainstream material in every industry, said Garry Balthes.
