Lost Spirits Technology Takes Home Global Prize for Innovation
05 Jan 2016 --- Lost Spirits Technology was awarded the top innovator prize of 2015, the "Global Master of Innovation" award, by leading publication - Spirits Business Magazine.
The prize was awarded for the Company's breakthrough in distilled spirits aging. In 2015, the Company was the first to faithfully recreate a 20-year equivalent mature spirit in a laboratory soundly defeating Cleveland Whiskey and Terressentia, as well private scientific labs run by multinationals. With this news, the recent resurgence in this global arms race to rapidly produce a truly mature spirit has come to a close, making the economic burden of traditional barrel aging a problem of the past.
Just over a year ago, Lost Spirits was the first to recreate a 20-year-old rum in a laboratory. Just a few cases of the 6-day-old / 20-year-mature rum were sent out for review (called the "Lost Spirits Colonial Inspired Rum"), and received positive critical review. The spirit was later analyzed using GC/MS and shown to have a nearly identically chemical signature to a 32 year old Demerara rum. The data was vetted publicly for Wired Magazine by UC Davis chemistry faculty.
In 2015, Lost Spirits began engineering the THEA | One aging reactors which can be operated by other distilleries. The reactors promise to greatly improve the quality of spirits world wide, while simultaneously improving pricing. The devices will allow the public to buy mature spirits (often priced at hundreds to thousands of dollars per bottle) for $40 and under. The breakthrough will also save tens of millions of dollars in evaporation losses (also known in the industry as the angels share).
Each THEA | One device will replace anywhere from six to twelve barrels monthly. For lengthy aging programs, running for twenty years or more, a single THEA | One reactor will eliminate the need to store 2,880 (52 gallon) barrels of aging stocks and provide nearly instantaneous cash flow to the distilleries using the THEA | One. Break-evens occur on equipment costs in just less than 3 months and monthly licensing fees are kept deliberately low at around $0.50 per bottle.
In January 2016 the first three commercial reactors will become operational in the U.S.A.- including two distilleries making rye whiskey - a category where mature stocks start at $800/per bottle and must be bought through auction markets.
Lost Spirits has raised an undisclosed amount of seed funding over the past year to finance the engineering costs. Funders include several major industry veterans including former key executives at multinational spirits companies, tech innovators and top-flight legal IP litigators. The announcement with a more detailed list of backers is slated for February.
