Elemental Enzymes Named Winner in Business Excellence Category of Fast Company’s 2024 World Changing Ideas Awards

From a solution to repurpose cold plasma to treat seeds to 3-D printed living seawalls, the eighth annual awards honor new and inspiring solutions to the most daunting challenges of today.

ST. LOUIS, Mo. (May 15, 2024) — The winners of Fast Company’s 2024 World Changing Ideas Awards were announced this week, highlighting fresh sustainability initiatives and other creative projects that are helping change the world.

Since the insect that causes Citrus Greening disease was first confirmed in Miami nearly 20 years ago, it has contributed heavily to the devastating 90% loss of orange production for growers in the state of Florida. When applied early in the growing season, Elemental Enzymes’ naturally derived peptide-based crop protectant, Vismax®, has proven it can safely slow disease progress by stimulating a tree’s immunity to fight the bacteria. This preserves more harvestable and better-quality oranges — all without leaving a harmful environmental footprint.

In recognition of Vismax’s potential, Fast Company named Elemental Enzymes as the winner in its “Established Excellence: 5-14 Years in Business” category. Additionally, Elemental was selected as a finalist in the competition’s “Agriculture” category.

“We are incredibly honored by and proud of this win,” says Elemental Enzymes CEO and co-founder Brian Thompson, Ph.D. “We have seen incredible results for growers of oranges and other citrus, and we believe scaling up the use of Vismax technology to different crops will be instrumental in protecting their yield and quality — making more food available to a growing global population, in enough supply to make it affordable.”

Last year marked the first sales of licensed Vismax products to treat U.S. citrus groves, following U.S. Environmental Protection Agency registration for providing protection to plants by nontoxic mechanisms.

This year’s World Changing Ideas Awards showcase 50 winners, 127 finalists and 172 honorable mentions — with health, education, energy, and A.I. among the most popular categories. A panel of Fast Company editors and reporters selected winners from a pool of more than 1,300 entries across numerous categories, including several new categories this year, such as beauty and fashion, health products, health services, materials and science and technology. The 2024 awards feature entries from across the globe, including the Republic of Korea, Brazil and Madagascar.

“I was struck this year by the global sweep of the honorees,” says Fast Company Editor-in-Chief Brendan Vaughan. “It’s endlessly inspiring to see how the world is coming together to devise inventive solutions to our most challenging problems. We need ideas from everywhere, and this year’s World Changing Ideas Awards are an extraordinary encapsulation of the innovation and creativity that is so abundant around the globe.”

ABOUT ELEMENTAL ENZYMES As legacy innovators, our persistent scientific curiosity drives complex solutions, implemented easily within existing systems. With a scalable sustainability pipeline of proprietary amplifiers, we continue to evolve partner opportunities to deliver real value. Elemental Enzymes is solving real problems with complex science to amplify your advantage. Learn more at www.elementalenzymes.com.