Meet an innovator: Simon Feasey

Simon Feasey, founder of Revolution Fibres, discusses his passion for innovation, problem-solving and product development. He describes himself as an entrepreneur and innovator.

Activity idea

Further explore the terms ‘entrepreneur’, ‘innovator’ and ‘inventor’. Simon refers to himself as being “an entrepreneur, an innovator and, to a lesser degree, an inventor”. Ask your students to discuss what each of these terms mean – how do these terms differ and how are they similar? The Key Terms article has explanations for these terms that could be used as starting point. Your students might enjoy finding examples of other people that can be described as either ‘entrepreneur’, ‘innovator’ or ‘inventor’.

UPDATE: In May 2021, Revolution Fibres rebranded to NanoLayr.

Transcript

Simon Feasey

For myself personally, I’ve always had a deep passion for innovation, I’ve always loved to confront other people’s problems and give my ideas about what I would do if I was them or how I could make it better. And so for me, this business has been incredibly exciting because I’ve had the opportunity to sit down with young minds and thrash out a whole new technology and I’ve absolutely loved it – it’s been one of my favourite aspects of this business – and also talking to these big companies, these very successful companies and introducing new technology to them and just showing them how it can make a difference and then having finished products that make a difference, you know, so it’s very satisfying.

I would say very much I am an entrepreneur, an innovator and, to a lesser degree, an inventor.

Acknowledgements Revolution Fibres: Simon Feasey Iain Hosie, Albert McGhee, Hansol Cha, Cody McClure

The Royal Society of New Zealand, TVNZ 7 in partnership with the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment