Milwaukee
Founded: 2016 | Employees: 3
rapidradicals.com
Funding raised: $1.5 million, non-dilutive
Product or service: Decentralized advanced wastewater treatment
Paige Peters started Milwaukee-based Rapid Radicals Technology based on her graduate school research on an approach to wastewater treatment that combined technologies on new applications. Her initial proof of concept has turned into larger and larger pilot projects, grant funding and other accolades, including winning the Governor’s Business Plan Contest.
How would you describe your company’s product?
Paige Peters, founder and chief technology officer: “A decentralized, high-rate wastewater treatment solution, targeting at the elimination of sewer overflows and basement backups during intense storm events. We can meet discharge permit requirements with our technology 22 times faster than conventional wastewater treatment.”
What are the next key steps?
“Last November, we received a $1 million National Science Foundation Small Business Innovation Research award to build a bigger version of the pilot. … That new treatment plant will actually be implemented at a remote location, so we’ll learn the challenges of operating end-of-pipe, decentralized, remote wastewater treatment to treat actual sewer overflow water, that’s a really big step.”
What’s your mindset for overcoming setbacks?
“Anytime we feel like we get stuck on something … we stop, we build some hypotheses and then we go talk to 30 people. … As long as we’re responding to a market pull, we’ll always be able to do something right and a lot of that comes with our ability to be wrong, to take a step back and look at something wholistically.”
