At the Sustainability Space Day at the Expo 2010 in Shanghai, China, Electrolux presented the innovative “nutrient control concept,” inspired by technology and learnings from the aerospace industry.
The nutrient control concept is a product-service solution that helps people keep track of their nutritional intake and minimize food waste in the cyclic, connected home. Electrolux draws valuable learnings on how space technology can help develop more sustainable products to meet future consumer needs.
The nutrient control concept is an application for mobile nutrition control when preparing or buying meals. It could be used as a mobile integrated solution at the restaurant. It is communicating seamlessly to create individually tailored portions, assist in grocery stores, and connect to the consumer’s kitchen. The inspiration behind the concept is the space sector’s solutions for nutrient control, with individually pre-packed food optimized for each of the astronauts. This could contribute to creating less waste and healthier consumers.
The concept was developed as part of the innovation and sustainability project Down To Earth, which gathered stakeholders from industry, government and academia, with the purpose of discussing how commercialized space technologies can generate a more sustainable world, while creating growth, innovation and new jobs.
For both states and corporations, space technology transfer is becoming big business. A calculation made by the European Space Agency, ESA, shows that every euro invested in space provides a return of 20 euros in spin-offs in other businesses and parts of society. This, along with the pressure to develop more sustainable products and services to meet higher market expectations, has raised the interest in space technology transfer among industry, academia and society.
“The overall objective of Electrolux is to develop household appliances that make consumers’ everyday lives a little easier,” says Christina Lindstedt, General Manager New Business Areas at Electrolux. “We want to sell products that satisfy the needs and desires consumers may not even know they have. Learning from the space industry is a different and exciting perspective and fits well our view of sustainability, which is already a vital part of our strategy. Down To Earth is an exciting project for us that can translate to future business opportunities.”
Within the same project, educational company AcadeMedia also presented the educational concept TRAINing at Expo 2010 while Sweden’s Lidköping Municipality presented the Green Collaboration Space concept, a venue for industrial renewal.
Down To Earth is a ten-year initiative founded by space design company Umbilical Design and Jönköping International Business School. It was initiated in Sweden, a country known for its high profile within both space technology, sustainability and innovation. The project has developed a multi-disciplinary open innovation process for commercializing materials, technologies and solutions from space. It aims to generate new innovations and ideas with focus on sustainability.
Learn more about Electrolux and sustainability here.
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