John Farley

I am John Farley CEO and founder of iBoxit Limited a sustainable packaging solutions company based at the Centrum on Norwich Research Park. Although iBoxit was incorporated in 2016 – because of a number of issues, not least of which was Covid we did not properly start on R & D until about 18 months ago Pre Covid I traded in Scottish salmon worldwide – this is the UK’s biggest food export, recording sales of £431m for the first six months of 2024, a 41% increase year on year due to demand from France, the US and China. Suggesting when published sales could be as high as £900m and rising. Whilst visiting one of the bigger processing factories on the west coast of Scotland I identified two significant issues which need to be addressed 1. The industry is one of world’s worst polluters of the planet 2.And the industry records the highest levels of spoilage and wastage of product in transit – an average days shift will ship 5000 single trip 25kg expanded polystyrene boxes which equates to over 1 and a quarter million a year – of which 19% end up in the sea and 35% in landfill. - the level of spoilage/wastage of product shipped worldwide can be up to 60% of product shipped to Dubai/ Hawaii and up to 20 % shipped to Europe About 18 months ago, I reconnected with Prof Sheng Qi from UEA and suggested we pitched for an Innovate UK grant to address the problems I had identified – We approached Laura Hill at NCC to enquire if we qualified for the Innovation Grant Mentoring Project – specifically bid writing, as this was the first time we had made an application to Innovate and really wanted to understand what the assessors would be looking for. We were delighted to be given the support, without which I highly doubt we would have been successful in being awarded a grant of £850k to bring to market a sustainable alternative to EPS, as well as an anti microbial film and spray which kills bacteria and increases shelf life of product Innovation relies on good collaboration – we approached industry, listened and discussed and in just over 12 months have two prototype formulations derived from a food waste product, a prototype single trip box which degrades into an organic fertiliser and a prototype multi-trip reuseable box derived from a plant based composite which has better thermal properties than EPS. The two box designs are carbon negative and have RFID tags to temp trace, impact and tamper trace as well as giving an exact location. We want to change the narrative around waste and make the recipient responsible for either its return or correct disposal. At the end of Q2 we will be carrying out a full scale industrial trial in associated with Flying Fish based in Cornwall who supply all Michelin Star restaurants and perhaps one of the biggest influencers in the UK the King. We have recently secured further funding from NRP to work with the Quadram Institute to test the formulation against listeria – if proven we not only have a shelf life enhancer, but we also have the basis for a sanitisation product which could revolutionise the food processing industry. There is a desperate need to reduce food waste and rid society of one of the worst pollutants of all time EPS – as a world we create 55 billion EPS boxes a year. The use of this pollutant extends much further and wider- such as packaging around white goods, lintols for construction, refrigerated panels and so on- the tech we have developed can be applied to all applications. Whilst the solutions are not local, regional or national but international, we want to establish ourselves as a leading world brand based in Norfolk and continue to innovate. We won the Innovation Hot House Competition at the Research Park in November, we have been shortlisted for the South Norfolk Innovation Business award and Climate UEA have nominated us for the Earthshot Prize.