Alec Anderson, managing director, Koolmill Systems Ltd.

Alec Anderson

Managing Director, Koolmill Systems Ltd

A pioneering visionary engineer and innovator who has developed a radical disruptive technology transforming the globally significant rice industry, moving it to a sustainable future and lifting millions from food poverty. Koolmill minimises wasted power and rice, delivering power savings of up to 80% producing more food at a higher quality from a finite valuable natural resource.

Alec’s story is one of resolute belief, persistence and innovation. What Dyson did to vacuum cleaners, Alec is doing to rice milling. Changing the established culture of a largely antiquated global industry is quite a challenge for an SME from Solihull, but not impossible. Alec has overcome the many technical, business and logistical barriers not to mention the two multi-national companies (one Japanese one Swiss/German) who have let’s say, not always made life easy.

R&D and innovation are the heartbeat of Koolmill. We are continually pushing boundaries driving change and lifting performance to levels that many in the rice industry find difficult to believe possible. Our current IP is just the start of a new road. The old legacy technology is over 100 years old and at the end of its life cycle. Alec has opened an entirely new field in cereal milling technology and this will inevitably attract many new entrants. Consequently our job is not done, we have to continue to innovate to stay ahead and there are many new innovations and a range of machines to come.
Now working through a Chinese joint venture he is building a user base in China from which to launch the expansion of the business into the rest of SE Asia, the Indian sub-continent and South America.

The significance of this development has been recognised in the UK (3 innovation Awards) and in China. In November 2014 Koolmill was awarded the prestigious GREAT British Product Award at the British Business Awards in Beijing. Particularly notable, as fellow finalists included the global supercar brand McLaren.

The Chinese Government has designated Alec as a National Expert in the Field of Technology and he has been placed on the Global Foreign Expert Recruitment Program (www.1000plan.org), one of only 1,000 global experts that will be recruited over a ten year period. He was awarded the West Lake Friendship Award for Foreign Experts by the Zhejiang Government in 2010, the only UK recipient that year.

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