Canadian winters are cold. Bone-chilling cold. Many of us waltz out to the car and grab the snow scraper to remove the frost that has accumulated overnight. This a daily occurrence during those chilly days. Imagine if this routine could be avoided.
At VeloCity’s DemoDay last Thursday, a team of 4th year design students from the University of Waterloo pitched their idea of a product called ‘NeverFrost.’ They declared that they’ve successfully created a solution that prevents frost, fog or ice to appear on any surface where contact has been made. Within 3-minutes the crowd was pining for its availability. As a result they won, for the first time in VeloCity history, two of the three cash prizes: Most Innovative Product ($1,000) and People’s Choice award ($1,000).
The team of four behind NeverFrost – Abhinay Kondamreddy, Khanjan Desai, Chong Shen and Cory Joon Youp Lee – couldn’t go into great detail about the specific ingredients, only that their patent pending idea will one day save its potential users a massive amount of time and money.
NeverFrost is a sprayable coating that can be applied directly to any surface where frost might appear. The initial focus for the nanotechnology startup is integrate its low-cost solution directly into the windshield washer fluid. In an interview with BetaKit, a NeverFrost rep stated they want the “additive included into windshield washer fluid so people don’t have to apply it… all you have to do is wash your windshield right before the night, or a couple nights before frost.” Apparently NeverFrost is in early talks with large retailer Canadian Tire.
NeverFrost also notes that they can go beyond car windshields and “can be sprayed on virtually any surface to prevent frost.” So this means deeper inclusion with car wash operations, airlines to help de-ice airplanes, any type of windows, refrigerators, air conditioners, and hydro lines to mitigate ice formation and potential power outages.
NeverFrost will be taking the idea to popular crowd-funding site Kickstarter later this summer. In the meantime, we captured the video below. The bottom line: NeverFrost works.
Update: We’ve received word that NeverFrost will not be going live on Kickstarted in September, but potentially by the end of 2013.