iSlices produces an innovative, cryogel eye pad (eye slices), which slowly releases active ingredients to the skin to combat a wide range of eye irritations. In 2000, entrepreneur and owner of iSlices, Kerryne Neufeldt, learnt that the CSIR’s polymer technology researchers had invented a water-soluble polymer gel that functioned as a dermal delivery system – in other words, a gel-like substance that could be liquefied and solidified to absorb and emit ingredients to the skin. The original inventors of this gel were Drs Patricia Truter and Walter Focke.

Neufeldt took advantage of the opportunity and negotiated an exclusive licence for the technology. It took her six years and R3.3 million (US$426,000) funding from 13 different institutions to perfect a scalable method for infusing the liquid active ingredients, and then turning the polymer into a gel of the right consistency. Once she designed the custom-made packaging that allows the gel product to be reused, iSlices was ready for market. By the end of 2006, the company had stocked the product in over 100 salons and spas in South Africa. In recent years international demand has been met by supplying the iSlices professional line to distributors in Mexico, Australia, Dubai, and the USA.

The Technology Top 100 award for sustainability is not the first award that the company and the product had raked in. In 2007 iSlices won the Technology Top 100 award for excellence in the management of technology in the Emerging Enterprise category. This followed on the 2006 Technology Top 100 award for the most promising emerging enterprise - the most noteworthy award for exponential business growth. Along with these Technology Top 100 awards are a number of other national and international awards ranging from best new beauty accessory to various entrepreneurship awards.

Says Neufeldt: “The team at iSlices is proud and honoured to have won this award and would like to thank all our suppliers, staff, customers, shareholders, friends and family who have all contributed to making our company a winner.”