MBA Polymers’ Founder and former CEO return to the business

The former Chief Executive Officer and Founder of recycler, MBA Polymers, have both returned to the business to help it “capitalise on recent developments” for growth.  

On July 13, Richard McCombs returned as MBA’s CEO and Dr Mike Biddle, MBA’s Founder, returned in a consulting role.

McCombs replaces Nigel Hunton, who was appointed as CEO in January 2012 after McCombs stepped down from the role. Prior to leaving, McCombs and Biddle successfully built three commercial scale facilities for recycling plastics from large and complex post-consumer waste streams such as WEEE (Waste Electronic and Electrical Equipment), ELV (End of Life Vehicles) and, more recently, household mixed plastics waste.

MBA has now become the world leader at recycling plastics from these streams on a global scale, with over 300 million pounds per year of processing capacity at its plants in China, Austria and the UK.

McCombs says this is now something he intends to grow upon his return to the business. “I’ve been working with quite a few CleanTech companies since stepping away from MBA over three years ago,” he explained.

“It’s even more apparent to me how remarkable it is that MBA was able to build three world-class plants in three different countries to deploy its technology and business models and produce MBA-branded resins that have been embraced by the global plastics industry for their quality as well as their environmental credentials.”

The company says it is now in a position to take advantage of significantly increased rates of plastics collection in North America, the US EPA allowance to recover plastics from shredder residue, the EU progressive recycling targets for plastics packaging (45 percent by 2020 and 60 percent by 2025) and calls from some groups to ban the landfilling or incineration of waste plastics in the EU as part of its Circular Economy proposals.

“I’ve been working to develop plastics recycling technology and businesses for over 25 years and I’ve never been more excited about the growth prospects for this industry,” commented Biddle.

“With MBA’s proven technology, world-class facilities and widely recognised market brand, the company is in an excellent position to capitalise on recent developments.”