JA Europe Gen-E Online Awards 2023 – Green Manufacturing Award Winners

Green Manufacturing as relevant topic for Europe’s youth

Gen-E 2023 is Europe’s largest entrepreneurship event, where thousands of young entrepreneurs, 15 years old onwards, showcase their cutting–edge business ideas and compete for the titles of best Company and best Start-Up of the year.

Throughout the 2022-23 school year, JA students across Europe have engaged in online Gen-E activities, built their Virtual Expo stands and applied for prestigious Awards. This year, JA Türkiye hosted the Gen-E 2023 European Entrepreneurship Event in İstanbul Türkiye between 11-14 July, 2023. EIT Manufacturing Central Director, Christian Bölling, served as one of the jurors for the main awards.

Apart from the Main Awards, there are so-called Online Awards provided by different organizations across various topics. This year, EIT Manufacturing recognized teams that have developed innovative products or services that use fewer natural resources, reduce pollution and waste, recycle and reuse materials, and/or develop new processes to reduce manufacturing resources and moderate emissions in their processes with the Green Manufacturing Award! The EIT Manufacturing Green Manufacturing Award was available for both the Upper-Secondary and University level.

During the school year, the growing online engagement of the JA youth across Europe through the #Gen_E Online Awards and Virtual Expo was clearly visible. In total, more than 1,000 JA businesses applied for Online Awards in 2023 – a new record! The Green Manufacturing Award by EIT Manufacturing was the most popular of all online awards, receiving the highest number of applications, thus making it the most competitive and challenging award to win!

The jury members from EIT Manufacturing Monika Primozic (Education Manager), Silvia Grätz (Business Creation Manager) and Gerhard Russ (Innovation Manager) evaluated all applications based on their level of innovation (to what extend the company uses novel application of materials and resources and/or new manufacturing processes) and sustainability (to what extent the company considers the entire value chain and life cycle of their product or service, including conception, supply and/or manufacturing as well as responsible consumption and/or disposal).

These JA companies are the winners of the Green Manufacturing Award 2023:

Upper-Secondary Level: ReBuild from Denmark

ReBuild aims to facilitate green building in Denmark in an easy and safe way. They provide a platform where buying and selling building materials is brought together, making it easy for users to find the product they are looking for. On the ReBuild website, it is possible to put used building materials up for sale and at the same time find other building materials that others have put up for sale.

Go to Website

University Level: ADSOL from Spain

ADSOL has designed and internationally patented a sustainable desalination plant model in collaboration with the University of Malaga, Spain. Their solution offers versatile water production as well as sustainable waste management that is 100% cost-efficient and solar-powered.

Go to Website

The popularity of the Green Manufacturing Award has demonstrated the relevance of the topic for today’s youth, and serves a testimony to the importance that today’s young entrepreneurs put on reducing pollution and waste, and using fewer natural resources in their business endeavors.

Listen to the JA Europe Podcast episode on “Green Manufacturing, a driver for business innovation and growth” with Monika Primozic, EIT Manufacturing former Competence and Knowledge Manager, Ignacio Colombo León, from the team Adsol Tech and winner of the Green Manufacturing Award by EIT Manufacturing and the podcast host, Salvatore Nigro, CEO of JA Europe.

The podcast episode is available on YouTube and Spotify.