Industry Events
The Alltech Ideas Conference (one19)
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by Vaughn Entwistle, Managing Editor, International Aquafeed n May, I attended my first Alltech Idea Ideas Conference (ONE19) in Lexington, Kentucky USA. First off, I have to say I was very impressed by three days of no-expense spared entertainment and seminars showcasing the very latest research in feeds. I was one of the 3,000 attendees from 70 countries who were bussed to various special events, beginning with a tour of Alltech’s stunning corporate headquarters and nutrigenomics research facility. (Alltech’s production facility is also located in Nicholasville, KY, but for food safety reasons could not be included in the tour.) I have worked in many different industries, but I have to say that Alltech’s HQ building was easily amongst the most impressive I’ve every visited. The love of science is a theme carried through campus statuary and even the building’s architecture and interior design, which includes double helix staircases. Alltech’s status as a major international company is reflected in the design of individual rooms, such as the South Africa room, which boasts objet d’art and paintings by South African artists. And as a reflection of the founder Dr Pearse Lyons’ Irish roots, the HQ even enjoys an authentic Irish pub (complete with a bar equipped with Guinness taps!) to host relaxing, after-hours meetings. Even more impressive is the fact that the company has grown from an 8,000 square foot facility back in the 1970s to this stunning, 200,000 square foot showpiece.
The plenary session
The first morning’s plenary session started with a bang, opening with a dazzling performance by iLuminate, a troupe of hip-hop dancers who lit up the darkened stage wearing LED equipped helmets and full body suits that strobed and flashed in rhythm to the music. With the audiences’ blood pumping, Alltech President, Dr Mark P Lyons PhD, took the stage to open the conference. If the conference had an overarching theme, it was how positivity in the face of adversity can overcome and accomplish amazing things.
This theme was later echoed by the conference’s three keynote speakers, who included Bear Grylls (the internationally-known adventurer/survivalist and television presenter), Chris Zook (Best-selling author of ‘The Founder’s Mentality’; Advisory Partner at Bain & Company) and Ramez Naam, co-chair, Energy ad Environment, Singularity University.
The Bear necessities
This year’ keynote speaker was Bear Grylls, Although his many television programmes have made him wealthy and famous, Bear shared with the audience many of the personal struggles he has faced in his life, including a serious injury after a failed parachute jump. Bear spoke about his four F’s: Failure, Fear, Fire, and Faith. The television personality explained that he has failed many times in his life, and those failures were never meaningless, because through them he learned much about himself. He related how, while serving in the British armed forces, he applied to join the elite Special Forces unit, the SAS (Special Air Service). The selection course for the SAS was extremely rigorous, and Bear failed on his first attempt. However, he was determined and reapplied to the course as soon as he was able. On his second attempt, Bear was successful and joined the elite regiment. Bear then equated his own life experiences and stressed that we have to face our Fear, and use our Fire (our will), and when that fails, draw from our Faith to see the task through. Those vital life lessons translate into our everyday lives, and a similar mindset is what we all need to embody to face the times at hand. Dr Lyons then joined Bear on stage, and in a moving speech, described how difficult his own life has been over the last year, first with the lost of his father and Alltech founder Dr Lyons, and then through the tragic loss of his sister. Dr Lyons stressed that, although we are living through turbulent times in which we must deal with challenges, such as a rising population. We face an urgent need to increase our food supply by one-third by 2050, while dealing with a worsening climate crisis. But despite these daunting challenges, the hopeful message