Displaying items by tag: education

Spain: Cemex’s venture capital unit Cemex Ventures announced the launch of its second LeapLab accelerator programme for high-potential start-ups on 30 November 2023. The programme introduces a cohort of five start-ups from around the globe, which will carry out pilot-scale tests of their technologies across 100 Cemex sites in 12 different countries. Throughout the process, experts from Cemex and partner organisations will support the work of the start-ups as mentors, pilot leaders, speakers and assistants, as well as providing business advice and support in network building. The selected start-ups are AI technology developers Introid, Mixteresting and Verusen, hybrid vehicle fuel optimisation company Movener and water monitoring specialist Waterplan.

Cemex’s executive vice president of digital and organisation development Luis Hernández said “Start-up acceleration is a key pillar of Cemex’s open innovation strategy, since the time to scale the technologies that enable us to build a better future is now. By combining the disruptive solutions and agility of start-ups with Cemex’s extensive industry networks and resources, start-up acceleration is a vehicle for tangible innovation generation.”

US: The Global Cement and Concrete Association (GCCA) has signed an international partnership agreement with the American Concrete Institute (ACI). Under the agreement, the partners will collaboratively develop and disseminate information on concrete production and its use in construction, with a view to advancing best practices in sustainability.

The ACI said "ACI cooperates closely with our international partners, benefitting everyone in the global concrete community. ACI looks forward to working with the GCCA towards a future where everyone has the knowledge needed to use the latest concrete technologies effectively to meet the demands of a changing world."

Switzerland: Holcim has announced new global social impact targets for 2030 under its new People Strategy. The targets fall under three pillars. These are ‘bridging the housing and infrastructure gap,’ ‘improving livelihoods’ and ‘upholding human rights.’ The company says that this will entail efforts to ensure adequate housing and infrastructure for all, support for health, education and skill building and the implementation of due diligence across its value chain. The strategy includes a target to create Euro468m of social value by 2030. The figure will include the total value of schools, hospitals, rural roads and affordable housing renovated or built in the period. Between 2016 and 2020, Holcim benefited over 31m people with Euro187.21m in social investment.

CEO Jan Jenisch said “Our business plays an essential role in society's progress. We build the roads, bridges, hospitals and schools that enable people to thrive around the world. With 3bn people expected to lack access to adequate housing by 2030, I am committed to putting our business to work to uplift our communities.”

US: Martin Engineering has launched new online conveyor training content. The supplier says that the content integrates with client customer learning management systems (LMS). It is intended to enable users to independently assign, monitor and certify progress of participants across all of a producer’s locations.

Training manager Jerad Heitzler said, “With this new effort in place, Martin has taken another step forward in global conveyor training.” He added “We’ve emerged as an LMS content provider to deliver greater flexibility and control over employee learning, helping customers attain the highest levels of efficiency and safety.”

UK: Mexico-based Cemex subsidiary Cemex UK has launched ‘Concrete – Focus on Sustainability,’ a Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) accredited continuing professional development (CPD) course for specifiers. The course tackles the key issues for accomplishing building projects’ sustainability goals when using concrete. It covers various industry initiatives and technologies designed to aid these goals.

National product support and CPD coordinator Mat Saunders said “The conversation around sustainability is currently at the forefront of the minds of everyone globally, and as an organisation we have a responsibility to contribute to that discourse in a positive manner. This is why we felt that educating industry professionals on what cement and concrete technology can do to help specifiers, clients and contractors meet their sustainability targets, while still using concrete to build safe, efficient, beautiful structures that we all live and work in, was paramount. Even at this early stage the course has been wildly popular, and we anticipate a significant uptake over the rest of 2021 and beyond.”