Guest
Samuel Alexander
- Introduction
Samuel is the founder and CEO of C2C (Concept 2 Consumption) Fashion and Technology LLC, an Austin, TX-based business providing its clients with access to a revolutionary B2B2C fashion ecosystem. Alexander’s experience spans more than three decades—and brings together expertise in both the fashion and technology industries.
Alexander is an expert in product design/development; global sourcing/production; strategic branding/marketing; and technology integration. He is an internationally recognized expert in ‘all things digital’ and has spoken at conferences such as South by Southwest, U.S. China Innovation & Investment Summit, MBDA Department of Commerce, IFAI Expo, and is sought after as a guest speaker by companies, countries, and institutions all over the world. He has been featured in publications such as Forbes, WWD, Apparel Resources, Austin Business Journal, and Thrive Global. Alexander has been instrumental in promoting the growth and development of numerous major labels including Levi Strauss, Votre Nom Paris, Gloria Vanderbilt, Jones of New York, Shelli Segal, David Dart, Laundry, Icon Aura, Willi Smith, and Sue Wong—among many others.
C2C Fashion and Technology is a full-service, one-stop consortium for any business with needs for interactive multi-media marketing, product development, and cloud technology integration. C2C Fashion and Technologies SaaS (Software as a Service) cloud-based solutions will connect all aspects of businesses from concept to consumption.
C2C Fashion and Technology enterprise is focused on reinventing the fashion industry through a unique integration of fashion, technology, medical, and the arts. The company endeavors not only to develop domestic production but also to do so in an ecologically sound and technologically-progressive way. Their goal is to be the leader in fashion technology focusing on Nano and biotechnology smart fashion. C2C’s main paradigmatic change affecting fashion is the reshoring of the fashion industry by embracing a sustainable concept and combination of “smart factories” + “smart networks” + “smart products.”
Topic Discussed
- Re-shoring of the fashion industry
- Hemp in the fashion industry
- Carbon credits and the circular economy
- Future of Fashion and Technology
- Reason we have to re-shore to America
Getting to know Samuel Alexander
Samuel Alexander introduced himself and said, I’m sitting down here in Austin, Texas, we call it the capital of the world. We also look at it as the new Silicon Valley, as you have heard about our movement here. And the growth here’s incredible what’s going on here in Texas, it’s exciting to be here. And just to give you a little shout out for Texas, we just became the eighth largest economy in the world, we exceeded Chile and Brazil. And the growth here is just phenomenal. My background, I’ve been in the fashion industry for the last 40 years, companies like Levi Strauss blurrier than the bell Johnson, the argument I can go through the list, on and on. I’ve also brought in most of your international companies to develop their business here in the United States. And I work doing private labels for a lot of major companies, and helping them to develop their products in our factories in China at this point.
The Focus to Make Change
Mandi Lynn Kerr asked a question and said, what got you into this, what really is driving your focus to make this change and to to really push him forward?
Samuel Alexander replied and said, Well, number one, we’re having to restore everything back to the US, the logistics problems that we’ve had to COVID. And also big issues with China’s geopolitics are going on there. And they’re having a little issue with global warming, just like everyone else in the world is having. So we’re having some water issues there. And they’re shutting down factories, and then also your COVID has shut down the factories there for like the last 60 days. So we’ve got a lot of issues of why we shouldn’t be sure. And then the other one is that the consumer right now is going to on demand customization and away from mass production. And you’re going to see them move away from doing the COVID, of course, to move away from a quantity of life to a quality of life.
Mandi Lynn Kerr commented and said, I think that’s really part of this paradigm shift we’re seeing was less about what this plastic bottle costs, right and more about what it costs long term. You know, it’s not just the dollar paid at the register anymore. It really is where it’s sourced what it’s doing to our planet who it’s affecting.
Samuel Alexander said, And that comes back to the circular economy, in which I would actually go back to school at my age and become certified in circular economy. And what we’re looking at and what you’re talking about a minute ago, is a paradigm shift that we’re moving into. And anytime you see new transportation, new communication, and then also new energy, you’re focusing on a complete paradigm shift of the world and it’s the largest one that I think anyone’s seen since we’ve been on this earth. And it’s also going to be based on rebuilding with sustainability and has the ability to give us the tools to build a sustainable society.
Hemp Plays The Major Role
Mandi Lynn Kerr asked and said, so talk to you about where hemp plays the major role. Now something that excites me is when I talk to people and they say well, why hemp you know, because we have an opportunity to provide localization, to localize manufacturing or to provide a better more sustainable material into manufacturing. Can you talk to me about how hemp is really playing a role in reshoring? Manufacturing?
Samuel Alexander replied and said, one of the key elements that we’ve always had is resources, and cotton has been our core resource. And with the issue with global warming and water, you know, we have the ability to utilize hemp, which only uses a fourth of the water on an acre of land that hemp does, and produces four times more crops and cotton does. So you’ve got an advantage with him. And then also all the products that we can make from him other than just fashion. I mean, there’s just a bit of the 1000 products that were cable, from food, to energy products to bio degradable polymers. And there’s just so many things that we can do with him that we can’t do with some of the other products out there. And I mean, other resources out there and minerals and things out there.
US Play a Role in the Global Supply Chain of Fashion
Mandi Lynn Kerr asked and said, So if you’re talking about this is something that comes up a lot from people, right? Where does the US really play a role in the global supply chain of fashion and of the fashion industry? And where do you think will really play a role in penetrating the market with hemp?
Samuel Alexander replied and said, we are a $2.2 trillion industry globally. And in the US, we consume 80% of everything made in the world, as everyone already knows, so there’s a huge opportunity here to transfer this back to the US. And with the new technologies that we have, we don’t have to worry about the labor costs. That’s why most of our factories moved away. We’re because of labor costs. But now we have on demand and robotics that we can utilize to offset those labor costs.
Mandi Lynn Kerr followed up with a question. So you think that really, in order for us to compete, we’ve got to have AI and machine learning?
Samuel Alexander said, our company is focused in on augmented, Mr and XR, and then also holograms, and then we do IoT, which is the future of everything, which is everything that can be connected, will be connected, only things that will have value of the things that you cannot connect, because everything else will become connected and become less costly. Then you’ve got your artificial intelligence and machine learning. And that’s going to create a displacement in the workforce. And so you’re going to see a lot of changes there. And then the final part of it is bots and robots, that’s going to even affect the workforce even more. So I work with a lot of the universities explaining to them what we’re talking about now and how they have to change up and start giving us the people that we need for the new jobs ever evolving. And you can already see that just to kind of give you an idea, the junior college here in Austin, ACC partnered with Tesla, and they’re training all their people here. So you know, in the certifications right now are becoming more important than actual degrees to a certain extent, not to say that you don’t need a degree, but the certifications are giving you the specialty skills that you need to be able to function in the new global economy that’s here in the US right now. So I see that we’re going to move away from mass production, and we’re gonna move away from a quantity of life to a quality of life. And that’s what you’ve seen the COVID Bring on is a quality of life.
Anyway, we are at a point now where artificial intelligence is not just something everyone’s talking about, it’s become a part of our lives every day. And most people hopefully are realizing how it is affecting their lives. Because I think sometimes we take a lot of things for granted the luxuries that we have by utilizing AI. And then machine learning is actually the behavior which we learned from you and to be able to satisfy your needs a lot more. And when we get into web three, which we’ll talk about down the road here, that’s going to change up everything, the way we understand the internet, because you become your your data about you becomes your data versus the other companies that are out there that are using your data to sell off to everyone else, right. And we’re getting ready to move into a whole nother evolution of technology with the web three.
The Job Aspect
Mandi Lynn Kerr asked and said, talk on machine learning something that comes up or AI or any of the technology that’s now being implemented. There’s this concern that Oh, you’re not going to bring jobs right where I see huge opportunity for jobs, not necessarily in the manufacturing or the processing of the raw material, but actually in what it’s doing by creating new products and new materials that are consistent and stable. Talk to me about the job aspect.
Samuel Alexander said, when the car came about, you lost a blacksmith. And, those type people in, over. So there’s going to be a transition of 800 million jobs globally that will be lost to technology. But they’ll also be new jobs that are created. And a lot of them will be in New Energy, medicine, and new transportation. So there’s a lot of other areas that are coming about. And you know, as you already know, data is the new currency. So you’ve got to learn how to manage data. And that’s where the focus is. And a lot of the universities that I work with right now are moving even crypto into the accounting areas, because the kids are demanding that they do it now that they understand what they have to prepare for. And then you’ve got all the other areas that are siloed, that now they’re breaking down the silos in the university so that these kids can be more rounded with their ability to have access to the things that they need to be able to get the new jobs that are coming about. And the thing about these new jobs, is they’re a lot higher pain, and create a lot more freedom for the people that are that have the jobs. And I don’t think anybody’s going back to the office.
Mandi Lynn Kerr said, Some of the people that we talk to are business owners, they need people in the office, they’re more productive, they like it better. And then there’s this opposite, right for me, especially if I’d love working remotely, we were talking offline about the convenience of being able to put 1010 appointments on my calendar by meeting in zoom is so much more. It happens so much more often than if I’m having to drive around town to meet people. It cuts my day in half, it costs more money.
Samuel Alexander replied and said, That’s a speaker becoming more sustainable, just in the dry cleaning deals.
Talk About Carbon Credits
Mandi Lynn Kerr asked and said, Talking about data, and data collection, and owning your own data, this is really important. When we talk about the carbon credits and the transfer and sell of carbon credits, can you talk to them about your involvement there or what your interest is?
Samuel Alexander said, We’ve started quite a new company called ag IQ tech. And what we’re working on now is pulling together the platform and web three for your Goss’s, which is decentralized autonomous organizations, and daps. We’re creating Daffs to be able to function on creating carbon credits. And what we’ve done is we’re bringing the farmers, the ranchers, and the forestry together, to help them to create carbon credits that they can help to develop more resources out in the field. So that’s what we’re working on now. So we’re actually building that out. And the Department of Agriculture has grants out that we were working on also, that they’re going to support this project with. So that’s, that’s kind of like where we’re headed to there. But your dos are in your donemus. I’m sorry, decentralized, autonomous organizations and your daps are decentralized applications, which actually run on the blockchain. And you know, contrary to what they won’t believe the blockchain is real, it’s not gonna go anywhere. And anybody can go talk about crypto and all this, but it’s all about where we’re headed to with the new blockchain technology.
The Time Frame
Mandi Lynn Kerr said, Well, it’s interesting to me, like I said, it’s, it’s a complete shift, there’s a lot of conversation about acceptance, at the government level of, of this new currency, and what does that look like? And how long do you know, is it expected? Can you give me kind of an idea of what timeframe is before more mainstream?
Samuel Alexander replied, Let’s redefine currency. Because some of the, the words that we use, like marketing, and currency, and I’ll go back to AI and, and artificial intelligence, machine learning, when you get into tech to the word marketing, you’re not looking at trying to sell someone something is about analyzing the consumers behavior, and creating products and offering those products that they don’t even know they want, before they even have the ability to understand that the trends have taken. So that’s where the AI comes into the so-called marketing aspect of it. As far as building out products, we can now do customization on demand, which is the next move that we’re moving to. So we’re moving away from mass production to customization on demand.
Carbon Credits and Farmers
Mandi Lynn Kerr asked, So talk to me about, carbon credits and farmers, there’s a lot of reservation from farmers that I hear around carbon credits, right, and making sure that it’s stabilized before we’re able to really offer it because what I hear sometimes is this concern that it’s another way to control or another way to, you know, kind of manipulate what they do or limit what they do put restrictions. What are your thoughts and what do you hear on the farm side and How involved is your organization in the entire supply chain from farm processing, manufacturing, and so forth?
Samuel Alexander said, Right Now you’re looking at the visibility of everything to the blockchain. And that even means for the government’s visibility of what they’re doing on the blockchain. So good visibility is going to help everyone to be able to move forward. And you know, people that are concerned about how it affects their purse, their security, they have to realize that the phone that they have in their hand, tells everybody more about them than everyone they want to know.
Mandi Lynn Kerr commented and said, I remember seeing, I mean, years ago, and it was like, Was the President saying thank you to Steve Jobs for collecting everybody’s thumbprint? And I was like, yep. We have a phone that just like you said it? It does. It’s very predictable.
Samuel Alexander said, And with the with the web three that’s coming, you’ll see that the governance will be more for the people than it is for people dictating you what your lifestyle should be, because you’ll have a conscious group of people that can actually start making decisions based on our needs versus what someone thinks we should, how we should function.
What do we see today
Mandi Lynn Kerr said, Well, it’ll be an interesting transition. And like I said, I want to dive into this more, I’d love to continue to talk because it is very much a different way of thinking for me. And I’m, I’ve been so focused on, what’s here in front of us? And what do we see? And what’s at the farm level? And how do we build infrastructure, because without taking care of our planet, you know, at our farm level in our soil, it’s scariest every outcome, right?
Samuel Alexander said, A lot of the things that we’re going to have to deal with are going to be going to be pushed out in necessity, not by people wanting to change, they’re going to be forced to change because of global warming, logistics, a lot of things that we’re dealing with geopolitics is going to force us to change quickly. Because when we find out that you just can’t keep printing money, to keep a consumption economy going, we have to start manufacturing products that can make us sustainable, then you got to see everything change, the government’s going to change, the farmers are going to change, everyone’s going to change and understand that there’s billions and billions of dollars that involve trillions of dollars that are involved in this transition that we have an opportunity to move into and help make us more sustainable as a country, and not to mention as local communities.
Focus in Fashion
Mandi Lynn Kerr asked a question, with a focus in fashion, can you talk to me about where the fashion industry is really going with him? And where is your involvement? And how do we support you? And yes, I want to dive into from farm to end product.
Samuel Alexander said, Walkman, the one of the great things that I love about your organization is that you’re actually pulling everyone together, and decentralized collaboration. And the focus of everything going forward is decentralized collaboration. And we have to be able to know who’s out there building right now. So we can work together and cut out some of the cost of duplication of efforts. And that’s the biggest thing that I see right now. And the silo mentality has to leave, because there’s no one out there that can even take a bite out of the market that’s about to evolve. So it’s an opportunity for everyone. And also, it’s an opportunity for us with him to make us more of a sustainable society and more eco friendly than we’ve been in the past. And, you know, just to give you an idea of how the, the fashion industry is responsible for 20% of the waterways for the whole world, we we are 80% tied into the petrochemical industry, 80% of our products are made for petrochemicals, we do, we are responsible for 8% of the carbon of the world. Wow. And then we also 80% of the products we make end up in landfills.
Mandi Lynn Kerr commented, So that’s another paradigm shift we’ve got to get away from.
Samuel Alexander said, well, that is probably worse, the second most destructive industry in the world, to the environment. So we have to change our ways. So what we’re doing right now is we’re moving away from mass production, the customization on demand, meaning that we have factories and the technology that we’re we have scanners that we can use on phone to scan you and create an avatar, that avatar then can be moved into our into our software, which then we can create the patterns for your body which are based on your actual size so that we know more sizes anymore, it would be what with what your actual causing and customize, then we it moves into a plotter. The plotter lays it out on the fabric and then our laser cutter cuts it exactly to your size. We can do this in three to five days. As far as the production cycle, I’m sorry, it takes seven days and then you can have it in your house in three to five days. So we’re building out factories now here in the US that are based on customization on demand. That’s why we need the hemp product right now as our core product to be able to build from so we’re looking at hemp as being a major part of the industry moving forward
Mandi Lynn Kerr said, And you’re looking at hemp as a material, right so you’re purchasing material from hemp producers.
Samuel Alexander replied and said, I’ve got boxes and materials that we just got in from samples that are in hemp right now from one of the vendors, that’s a good buddy of yours. Yeah, that sent us the fabric here, we are ready to start making samples. And what we’re not looking to do is mass production, we’re looking for customization on demand. So it’ll be a constant cycle. And we have software that we’ve developed that takes it all the way back to the mill that gives them projections on how much fabric we need. And then the consumer can actually design their own product over 100 trillion skews in our inventory that they can design for.
Mandi Lynn Kerr said, I year ago, met somebody that had developed something like this for the construction industry for the same thing that would be able to track future builds, so that manufacturers weren’t stacking up pink toilets, because, you know, they went out of business the year after they manufacture them or went out of style, you’re actually manufacturing and they would be able to, you know, project ahead of time. So it basically reduced the storage and the waste basically. It’s just fascinating to me, the shift here that we’re seeing, and the benefit that comes with it on the benefit on the business side to not have to guess on what people are gonna buy, or guess people are.
Samuel Alexander, The other side of that is the raw materials that we’re running out of even with cotton right now with the water shortage we’re having, we’re having cotton, cotton issues all over the world. So you’ve got to think about right now in our industry to air good efficiency and usage of raw materials. Japan is at the highest with 15%, aggregate efficiency usage of raw materials to pay. Germany’s at 14 and a half in the US is at 14, we have another 85% of raw materials that we can utilize with the circular economy. If we start planning the lifecycle of a product upfront versus just making products, we’re gonna end up in landfills.
You asked another question earlier, how are we moving forward with this? My goal is to work in the sector. I work with private industry, education, and government to help the community. And what we’re in everybody right now is coming in and understanding the tri sector. And that’s where the future of this country is gonna have to move to survive what transition that we’re about to go through.
Collaboration is the Key
Mandi Lynn Kerr asked and said, Yes, collaboration is key. I mean, you’ve got to be able to pull together like you said, so talk to you about facilities that you’re putting in, where are you looking at, you know, what does that look like? How do people get involved?
Samuel Alexander said, Well, right now, we built our first advanced manufacturing facility here in Austin. But the key right now in the tri sector is we have to start educating and training the people to understand and utilize these new technologies. So that’s why we’re working in the tri sector and the first facility we built was the ACC and Olson Community College and it has a complete advanced $15 million facility, Gerber technology, the city of Austin and Austin Community College partnered for this facility. We’ve got actually 20 designers now in house that are designing and utilizing this technology. And it’s all about nano biotech products. We also work with smart cities and develop products for the smart cities that are interactive with the Smart Cities.
Hemp in Military
Mandi Lynn Kerr said, This is so cool. It’s a huge project. they’re becoming real, they’re no longer just thoughts, right that people are really building. Can you talk to me a little bit about what Texas is doing? You know, what about and what military what you’re seeing from the military as far as pulling for hemp?
Samuel Alexander said, I can’t speak a lot about the military because I have A’s on all the stuff.
Mandi Lynn Kerr said for example, I know right now, the military, there are people working on uniforms from military advocates. Right. And I know that there’s also a need or a drive for r&d around plastics, you know, made out of hemp.
Samuel Alexander said, Just to give you an idea of the unit, the military uses 50 million units of product a year. shirts, jackets, hats, underwear, all those products? 50 million units a year? Yeah, so there’s a lot of growth there. I mean, it’s, but also we’re focused on the Nano biotech of products now, which we’re integrating all kinds of chips and all kinds of fibers into, into the garments, quality of life, you know, it’s all about the quality versus the quantity now.
Mandi Lynn Kerr followed up the question and said, “What about Texas in itself, like with Tesla, you see Tesla’s starting to use hemp. Do you see graphing going into batteries? This is something that was brought to my attention a long time ago, the graphene aspect. But there’s still this unknown about.
Samuel Alexander said, one of the one of the groups that I work with here in Texas has already been Well, a battery that charges 10 times faster than normal batteries do. And it lasts 10 times as long as far as I’m not 10 times, two and a half times as long as what the existing batteries do. So they’re already developing these technologies and, and there’s so many we’re just on the frontier right now of all these new technologies. And, you know, the key right now is, everybody’s talking to electricity, but hydrogen is what they’re really working on. So you’re talking in that new energy area, hydrogen and electric cars are the key areas as far as that new energy’s.
The Farm Side
Mandi Lynn Kerr asked and said, So I want to talk about, like the farm side, and I don’t know where your involvement is here or where interest is, but right when we talk about, we’re not going to kill the earth, or if he’s going to eject us right off, and then it will reveal and we’ll be gone. And with that, we’re doing damage, you know, every day and that global warming is real. And this reality that we’ve got to fix and start at the soil, you know, farm and crop, where where do you see real drive or growth happening, you know, at the farm, and really going back to taking care of our farmer and making sure that this capital goes back to the farm and isn’t sucked up just at the manufacturing or distribution?
Samuel Alexander said, Okay, I’ll start out with where your question was a minute ago that I never went into detail with, with the carbon credits, we are not just creating carbon credits for the farmers, ranchers and forestry, we’re creating a marketplace that they will be like a banking system for them to utilize those carbon credits for within the ecosystem that is being built. So you’re cutting out the middleman is what is going to happen going forward. So their costs will go down from doing business. You’re also looking at the ability for them to even mostly feel watch, most of the people are buying large plots of land, ranches and farms right now, and moving out of the cities. So there’s opportunities there for those people with carbon credits, the farmers right now are going to become even more important because there’s three things that we have to be focusing on right now in the country, food, water and shelter. And I think we spoke a little bit about that on the 3d printing of homes, that’s going to be a major issue because of the homeless issues that we’re having throughout the country. So the farmers, you know, have an opportunity with that. It’s gonna be a quick gear up. But the key point right now is the collaboration and understanding of what type of infrastructure we have to build out to be able to facilitate everything that we’re doing. You know, when they passed the laws for hemp, everybody ran outside growing, but there were no processing facilities.
Mandi Lynn Kerr said, Growing cannabinoids or CBD, high THC, low THC.
Samuel Alexander said, I think you’ve, you’ve really hit on that by separating the medical from the industrial that’s going to help that a lot. And I was my partner that we had the meeting with last week. He actually sent me a bill, I’ll send you that they’ve already done that, apparently in Louisiana. Okay. Yeah. So it’s already there. So I’ll send that out to you. I would love to see what they’re doing.
Working With Any Communities of Color for Affordable Housing
Mandi Lynn Kerr said, There’s another question Hector. And for anybody that doesn’t know him. He is incredible, an awesome farmer and works great with communities. So I encourage you guys to reach out.
What are you working with any communities of color for on affordable housing?
Samuel Alexander said, We’re actually working right now with the I always get HB ca. Historically, black universities? Yep. HBCU. Yeah, we’ve already got three of them that have joined the US board for ag IQ. And we should hopefully have them all here shortly. But as far as affordable housing, we’re just now getting all that up and running. That’s why we were speaking with you on the hempcrete, and those type things that we’re resourcing. But we have a 3D printer that is ready to go, we just got to get out of the concrete and we can do it with cement right now. I mean, regular cement, so we’re looking at that aspect. So that would be Heather, the lady that you spoke with last week. Yeah, she’s in Georgia. That’s her company. And she’s working on that, that aspect of it. So it’s all decentralized collaboration. We’re all a part of ag IP, but we’re all working in different areas to bring all this together into a sustainable situation for the whole country. As far as housing, food, shelter, I mean, propel the food and water. So that’s our goal right now as an organization is to bring those things together and have everybody become more sustainable.
Mandi Lynn Kerr said, love it. Okay, so here’s a great comment. It was just brought up. Hector had mentioned earlier that hospitals are also huge avenues for resources, for help materials to get into. Hector is currently working with a local university to do the same thing to bring sustainable materials and a lot of the universities have, or universities and hospitals have sustainability staff or staff on payroll to look into sustainability and source sustainable materials. And he’s curious, are you working? You’re obviously already with the government. Are you working on the healthcare side also?
Samuel Alexander said, here’s, that’s a whole area. There’s a whole community that’s already doing that, what we will do is go to that community and offer them the resources that we’ll develop. And that’ll become a part of the decentralized collaboration and, and just to give you an idea, I have antibacterial, antifungal, and antibacterial, antifungal, and antiviral products that we can incorporate into the clothing.
Technology in Fashion
Mandi Lynn Kerr said, the technology in fashion is mind blowing. When I first started getting into this and just learning what they can do to manipulate fibers and to change its reveal factor.
Samuel Alexander said, I think there’s a lot of misconceptions in fashion just like there’s about the hemp industry. Basically, ours is science, the STEM science, technology, engineering, and art and math, because the hard part is word, mostly everyone sees, sees our industry. But no, it’s very technical for as far as the scientists that have to be involved in just the making of a fiber alone.
Mandi Lynn Kerr said, When we as consumers walk into Walmart, or the mall or any store, retail store and pick up our clothes, we do not realize what goes into it. And when we’re shopping for a $5 T shirt compared to one that lasts longer, it’s healthier for us, it’s more sustainably sourced. That’s a big shift that needs to happen.
Samuel Alexander commented and said, And those are some of the things that’ll be verifiable in the new technology. With blockchain, you’ll be able to know from the time like you were asking earlier from the soil, what, what nutrients and nutrients and things that you were putting into the product all the way through to the lifecycle of that product, we’ll be able to track that now and be able to reuse of resources in a more sustainable way.
Regenerative Agriculture
Mandi Lynn Kerr asked a question and said, I want to bring up what regenerative agriculture means to you? And how can we use indigenous practices to save our soils? And Hector, I’m actually going to throw this back to you. Also, I’d love to have you or your group come on at any time or any of your contacts and specifically talk about indigenous practices. I would love to incorporate what that what that looks like and help educate. But do you have any feedback on what regeneratively does?
Samuel Alexander said, One of the other collaborative partners that we’re working with has mines in Bulgaria, and we’re bringing zeolite into the country. zeolite is a mineral that actually adds nitrogen back into the soil. Okay, and what’s your hemp, it’ll probably grow twice as fast. I’ve seen videos on the growth of it, it’s, it just helps the growth of the hemp. So we have that that we’re bringing in now. And we’re utilizing it and with CBD, CBD and oils, and creating all kinds of lotions and products. And that is another group that I’m working with, now that it’s bringing the zeolite in from Bulgaria. So there’s just every, every day, there’s another group of people that come in and say, Okay, we have something that we can bring to it. It’s like I look at it as a potluck. Everybody brings their best dish to the table, we don’t just have a meal, we have a feast.
Focus Around ESG
Mandi Lynn Kerr said, in order to birth in industry and restore manufacturing, it’s going to take collaboration, and it’s going to take a lot of capital in order to have capital that’s willing to invest in the longevity of the industry, right? It’s going to take someone that’s looking at that. I guess what, let me go back. What’s fascinating to me about capital coming into the industry is the focus that really comes around ESG.
Samuel Alexander said, Well, you’ve got the key to any business. And that’s something I have trouble with with capital, is that if you create revenue streams, then you don’t need capital except for growth. Your investment capital is only needed for growth. If you’ve got to sustain yourself with investment capital, then you don’t have a viable business. o you need you there’s always money for growth when you’re growing so fast. There’s always capital out there for your growth.
Market Scale
Mandi Lynn Kerr said, Yes, it is well, and I’ve got an advisor that tells me money follows value. You know, okay, so talk to me about as you’re building facilities, there’s some discussion about what is that point where we enter the market and maintain state, you know, competitiveness as the market scales, know, what’s, what’s the volume of production and what’s the size of facilities that are needed? Do you think about the manufacturing for hemp before it gets to the fabric, right? Where do you anticipate the appropriate scale for the market?
Samuel Alexander replied and said, Im probably the wrong person to ask that. I’m just curious. I’m on the front side of it. I do mostly development and marketing and branding and those types of things. So for that aspect, there’s always engineers that I have usually sitting in the room to answer questions like that. So I’ll leave that to those guys. But right now, I think that the key part is just as you said earlier, the collaboration, we have to get everyone knowledgeable, who’s out there, and how we can all start working together, because this is going to be a fast process. We’re gonna, and it’s not going to be because we want to, we’re going to be forced into it.
Mandi Lynn Kerr replied and said, So scale of the market on the consumer demand side and product and development side, how much what’s the material that would be needed? And what’s the need for I’m kind of trying to gauge on your perspective and your understanding of the market and the fashion industry, what the demand will be on the farm side to match that.
Samuel Alexander said, Okay, number one, there’s no more industries, it’s all IoT, everything is connected. And what we have to do is break down those silos, and understand the connectivity that we have within the products. The key that we’re doing right now, it’s like I said, we’re nano biotech. And just in the wearable as technology part of the industry, we’re looking at a $150 billion industry by the year 2030, you’re looking at a $100 million industry in the fashion industry, just in hemp alone, in the next five to 10 years. So there’s a huge growth cycle that’s going to happen here in a very short period of time, then the big thing to on is what you’re doing that’s very good, as you’re educating everyone, that hemp is not a drug, just a drug you smoke, it’s it’s got so many other attributes that we haven’t taken advantage of. And we have to ask ourselves, why was hemp taken off the market with the advantage that it has over all the other products out there. And you know, it’s all politics. So we are now at a point where politics is going to move away from it because of Demand. And demand always overcomes everything else. So we have a huge demand right now, because we don’t have the logistics problems that have been created with this COVID. And also, with the geopolitics of going to create huge demands in the next six months. I mean, we’re not talking about a long period of time, you’re gonna see shortages that are going to come about in the next 60 days that people can’t even imagine.
Mandi Lynn Kerr commented and said, we’ve all talked about it since the pandemic started, right is what to expect and how this is going to impact and like you said, the consumers and people that have been disconnected from that supply chain conversation are really going to start being impacted.
Samuel Alexander said, ust to give you an idea, at one point, a container for if you could get it went from 3500 to $32,000, a container, a container ship, at one point went from $20,000 a day up to $250,000 a day, those products that when that price, they’ve come down a little bit now, maybe to about half of that. But now those products that are coming in, that are coming in, are based on those price points on those containers, who’s going to pay for that mandate? Is everyday things that we deal with. But most people don’t have a clue that that’s happening, not to mention, you’ve got all these products that they finally unloaded off the boats. And there’s a glut of it in the stores but its products to consumers are soft goods and hard goods that the consumer has no need for because they’re spending most of their money on food now.
Hemp Biomass
Mandi Lynn Kerr said, Mark has a great question. I know we had talked briefly about it in the beginning. Have you seen any groups or many groups working on green hydrogen with hemp biomass? Is it a waste of biomass?
Samuel Alexander said, We have another guy in within the organization rocky Wood, who you rocky would be the guy to answer all those questions and I’ll be more than happy to put his information because he’s Rocky and Rocky can answer a lot of those questions out there on that aspect he’s he’s the authority in that area.
Mandi Lynn Kerr said, we’ve got a great comment here talking about indigenous practices of cannabis from India and China over 1000s of years of culture for medicinal heritage yet we see very little about cannabis.
Samuel Alexander said, where and how they get in the space as they should be leaders in the spaces they ascribe and Holistic Cannabis. Not isolated CBD. I think that, as far as that goes, the medical aspect is not where, you know, I know a lot about that area. And like I said, they’re just you. There’s another company that we work with that is utilizing the CBD and those things and lotions and things with the zeal line.
Zeolite
Mandi Lynn Kerr said, here’s another question about the zeolite. Have you done many studies with zeolite on hemp? The most important things?
Samuel Alexander said, so there’s a lot of things that you know, and I’m not an authority on everything, I just do the marketing and product development. And these guys are coming in as collaborative partners, and everybody’s bringing in their own best dish to the feast. And this is going to be a good run for people because we’re going to help the Earth.
Mandi Lynn Kerr commented and said, To learn more about this, this zeolite. This 40% less water. And this is where I think we’ve got a real opportunity for scaling, the industry is coming into it from an angle of, you know, less inputs, and that includes water and pesticides and herbicides. But the water conversation around my area is critical. I don’t know about where you’re at?
Samuel Alexander replied and said, I went up to Mason, Texas, which is north of Austin, and Guadalupe River was bone dry. Lake here is 40%, lower than normal. And I don’t know if you know, but we do a lot of rice farming in south and south Texas. So water supply there is almost non-existent. It’s just that it’s going to be a major problem everywhere. your hemp and your zeolite and all those type things are going to come into play. And that’s what we’re building out is that infrastructure to be able to bring all these components together, and everybody utilize them to our advantage.
Collaboration/Partners
Mandi Lynn Kerr asked and said, Have you collaborated with effort between MIT and Rhode Island School of Design?
Samuel Alexander said, One of my partners is working with MIT, and they’re out of Italy. And they are they work and but they work in AR Mr. XR, they’re doing all of the technology there for that. And that’s what we utilize in the front part of our technology. They work there. But with an IQ, we’ve already got universities that are signing on as partners with us to help develop this, these new carbon credits. So they’re going to be doing they’ll get the grants for the from the government to be able to monitor and help the farmers and ranchers with their carbon credits. And it’ll so it’s all about the try sector, and the universities that are ones that we’re bringing on as partners to help out in developing the trifecta.
Team on The Textile Side
Mandi Lynn Kerr said, I’d love to have an update from you guys on here, pretty soon. Also, you guys have done a great job collaborating and have built a great team around what they’re doing would be a great contact for you as well. I don’t think they’re as much on the textile side, but definitely in conversation, definitely have the experience on product development, and equipment and stuff like that. So it’s pretty cool. Anything else you want to add before we hang up? And like I said, I’m gonna give another shout out. I’d love to invite your team to come on. I’m really interested in this oil and hemp additives.
Samuel Alexander said, You spoke with West, and he owns all the real estate down in Louisiana that they’re already growing him on and what they’ve got Louise, come to university universities there that are already signed up. And like I said, we’re working with historical black colleges and bringing them on because they were all agricultural schools. That’s so we focused on them first. So there’s always a lot of things that are out there, you know, we’re looking at opening doors with everything from hydroponics to aquaponics. Anything that we can do to help the growth industry here in the US is what we’re looking to do. And that’s all and I’ve my background right now is I’ve created a global ecosystem for connectivity, where we can connect everybody into one complete ecosystem.
Hawaii Major Role in Growth of the Industry
Mandi Lynn Kerr said, There was a question that just came in from a Hawaiian ninja. Do you believe that Hawaii has a major role in the growth of the industry? And this brings up a question for me is regions of industry, which are going to be manufacturing or developing products specific to their region, so you kind of talk about what that looks like, or what landscape looks like, what made us roll.
Samuel Alexander said, I’m sure that every country, every state in the United States, and everyone in the world is going to start growing hemp in a short period of time, once they see what we’ve been able to do here in the US. And I think what you’re doing with the laws is forged to help to get that separated off is going to be a major part of that. The other thing is that every state is this is gonna be huge revenue streams for for the state from the standpoint of the medical part of it, and the the textile and other uses, you know, biofuels, bio plastics, all the things that can be built from hemp are going to be major industries within the every state. So I think that every state should be focused on this now and figuring out how to help us to develop this as quickly as we can.
Mandi Lynn Kerr commented and said, Well, and I think you bring up a good point, right? So much of this, what I like so much about what you’re doing in the textile space is the manufacturing, per order or custom manufacturing, right. And I think that that that speaks to where industry is headed, or where we’re headed in manufacturing, you know, which gives each state or each region region opportunity to really, really sustain a sustainable, sustainable as well as compete on an on a bigger level, right, we’re not going to or what we’re trying to get away from, is shipping products all over the world, and then back to where they were grown to be sold. And, speaking to the comments about Hawaii, I think Hawaii has a role and Hawaii has no company or has residents and needs just like all the other states.
Samuel Alexander said, I think also that the growth potential of hemp being as easy to grow as it is, once the, you know, the a&m is right now doing a lot of research on the different seed qualities and different areas and minerals that it takes to maintain the crops. And I think that that’s going to be a key player in this. And I’m sure you’re working with some of the other universities also that are working on those things. So there’s just a lot of collaboration that we need to start putting people in the same room together. So we can start building a stronger base. We get the base going, it’s gonna spread like wildfire.
Mandi Lynn Kerr said, another Good question that definitely speaks more to your language, do you see a world where the IoT data will be open source to allow for enhanced collaboration or most groups will be protected with their data encrypted.
Samuel Alexander said, our data in web three, you will own. And that’s going to be the change from web two to web three. And, and right now, you know, everyone should keep an eye on this launch next month of Aetherium. Because they’re launching the merge. And if it goes through, they’ve already tested it. It’s going to change everything the way we know it. And when you move to web three, you own your own data, the other companies don’t own your data anymore. And once our government understands this technology, then they’ll set up some standard There’s that we need right away, because it’s the wild, wild west for everything that we’re doing now. And we need to work closely with the government to give them the understanding of what we need out here. Whether it be amp, whether it be technology, we’re this is the largest paradigm shift in history of the world that we’re going through. And there’s all brand new things coming about. And nobody has a viewpoint on how to control all the things that we’re about to go through. So we need decentralized autonomous organizations where there’s some governments within the organizations that know the direction that we’re taking, and the standards that we need to set up as we go. So the whole web three is going to be the next step of helping us to evolve everything that we’re working on.
Data and Collaboration
Mandi Lynn Kerr asked again and said, Do you think that it will still allow for collaboration? Or do you think by people owning their own data, that collaboration will be limited, and I think we’re still going to run into that lack of place, or lack of transparency that may be needed.
Samuel Alexander said, the data that we need, will be available just in the usage of the products and the usage of the technology? What they’re talking about is your private data is going to have to be locked down to where you’re not giving away all your personal data.
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