HOT COMMODITY

0 Comments | La Crosse Tribune, Jul 08, 2002 | by Cahalan, Steve

INOV8 International Inc. of La Crosse, a manufacturer of furnaces that burn waste oil, has brought new life to part of the Isola Laminate Systems Corp. plant at 1300 Norplex Drive, which closed at the end of March.

The company will hold a ribbon-cutting ceremony at noon Wednesday, followed by an open house with tours, to mark its move to about 10,000 square feet of factory space and 4,000 square feet of office space, in the Isola building. The public is invited.

INOV8 started in 1990 and had been in 5,000 square feet of leased space at 224 Causeway Blvd. for six years. It outgrew those quarters and moved June 1 to the new location, where production resumed in late June.

INOV8 has 12 employees, and president Rebecca Faas of La Crescent, Minn., hopes that figure will at least double in the next year. It expects to lease additional space in the Isola building as production increases and to eventually construct its own building.

"We hope to expand to 25,000 square feet of (factory) space before we need to do something else," Faas said. The company probably will be in the Isola building two to three years before moving into its own building, she said.

The company has more capital available for expansion, since former Isola Laminate Systems President and Chief Executive Officer Donald Jobe of La Crosse became half owner and CEO of INOV8 on May 2. Jobe's experience in management and foreign trade also will help the company grow.

Jobe was with Isola Laminate Systems and its predecessors for about 30 years before he resigned last October. That included two years in which he was based in Germany and seven years when he was based in Hong Kong.

Jobe said he decided to become halfowner of INOV8 because "I thought it would be a good investment and a way to keep busy. And I could help with my management skills."

He said he was introduced to INOV8 officials last August

Faas said INOV8's sales have increased steadily since her parents, Harry and the late Grace Ann Foust of Onalaska, started the business in 1990.

Jobe said he expects sales to increase 30 percent this year and another 30 percent next year.

He thinks Asia will be a good market for INOV8's products. "Their laws are changing, as they are becoming more environmentally conscious," Jobe said.

Jobe, who also does consulting work for U.S. companies that are trying to do business in China, said he has been in Asia virtually every month since he resigned from Isola.

Some of INOV8's company's customers include fastfood restaurants, automotive service centers, city and state governments and airports, Faas said. It has sold its products to more than 1,000 customers, mostly in the United States and Canada, but also in such distant places as Greece, Ireland, England, the Philippines, Guam and Australia.

The company makes furnaces that burn waste oils such as vegetable oil, animal fat and lubricating oils; makes evaporators that are fueled by waste oil and evaporate water from wastewater; and buys and modifies boilers that use waste oil to create hot water for heating. It soon will start selling a new boiler system that burns wood and waste oil.

Its products are good for the environment and help businesses save money, INOV8's owners say. For example, Jobe said, one prospective customer is paying 85 cents a gallon to dispose of water contaminated with oil. He hopes to sell the prospect an evaporator that would pay for itself in less than a year.

Today, INOV8 is owned by Jobe, Faas, Foust and Faas' sister, Nancy Stenberg of La Crescent. Foust continues working full time as vice president of engineering and product development. Stenberg, who has been with the company since it started in 1990, is production manager.

Foust, the company's founder, received a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1956. From 1956 to 1962, he was a research engineer for Ford Motor Co. in Dearborn, Mich.

Foust, a mechanical engineer specializing in heat transfer technology, then spent 20 years at The Trane Co. in La Crosse, most of them in advanced product research. His job was eliminated in 1983 as Trane was being acquired by American Standard Cos. Inc. - the acquisition was completed in February 1984. "So then I started doing consulting engineering work," Foust said.

From 1987 to 1989, Foust developed his furnace for burning waste oil. In 1990, he and two employees began making and selling the product. INOV8 started at 1240 Clinton St.

Like the company's other products, the furnace benefits the environment and saves companies money, Foust said. "And it provides an alternate source of energy," he said.

His daughter, Faas, became principle owner and president of INOV8 in 1996.