Manuel Rendon is an American scientist, inventor, environmental engineer, and the founder and CEO of Timeplast and String Cubed. A former PepsiCo sustainability executive, he holds multiple U.S. patents for water-soluble, time-programmable materials engineered to replace conventional plastics.

Born in San Cristóbal, Venezuela, he trained as an environmental engineer and built a career at PepsiCo, rising to an international environmental health and safety coordinator role. Working inside one of the world's largest food companies, he became convinced the real problem wasn't a lack of recycling, but the material itself.

He then founded Timeplast, filed his first U.S. patent for a plastic-degradation technology, and left PepsiCo to focus on his company. After almost ten years of R&D, Timeplast managed to develop a water-soluble, time-programmable copolymer: a material engineered to look and perform like conventional plastic, stay water-resistant for a programmable period, and then molecularly dissolve in water instead of fragmenting into microplastics. Rendon being the inventor with multiple granted U.S. patents covering this family of technologies.

The work has earned validation from well beyond the company. In December 2020, Nestlé Waters North America invested in Timeplast to explore alternative packaging technologies, forming a joint operation to test its technologies, coverage that ran in Food Dive, Packaging Insights, and other industry press. In September 2022, CNN en Español featured Rendon in a segment demonstrating the material; in 2023 he presented Timeplast at the Equiplast trade fair in Barcelona, where the show's focus on reformulating plastics was covered by Catalan public broadcaster TV3 as one of the only two companies broadcasted live in the news segment. That same body of work was named a finalist in the Packaging Europe Sustainability Awards. Timeplast has also raised growth capital directly from the public, oversubscribing two SEC-regulated Reg CFs campaigns, first at StartEngine and then at DealMaker, both campaigns backed by almost 10,000 individual investors around the world.

Through String Cubed, Rendon leverages analog computing principles to apply Timeplast’s material platform into functional, printable products. Together, Timeplast and String Cubed developed the TimeMass line of functional 3D-printing filaments, including first-of-its-kind filaments like photovoltaic printable matrix, protein filled filaments like TimeMass Fish Bait, and the first ever printable soap filament. The 3D-printing publication Fabbaloo reviewed the lineup independently and pointedly described the materials as practical rather than gimmicks, and Timeplast's filament has been independently featured in Tom's Hardware's coverage of sustainable 3D printing as well.

Rendon describes his larger goal as a push to take Humanity to a Type 1 Civilization in the Kardashev scale, bringing analog abundance through a fundamental shift in how humanity makes things: materials designed in harmony with a water-based planet, engineered to return safely to nature at the end of their useful life. From packaging and agriculture to consumer goods and on-demand 3D printing, his mission is to prove that "time of use can perfectly match lifespan” can replace "built to last forever" in the products people use every day, regardless if a product is designed to last for thousands of years, or just a few minutes.

SOURCES:

- Nestlé Waters North America investment — Food Dive:

‍ ‍https://www.fooddive.com/news/nestle-explores-alternative-packaging-technologies-with-startup-investment/592088/

- Nestlé investment, additional — Packaging Insights:

‍ ‍https://www.packaginginsights.com/news/a-digestible-problem-nestle-waters-bites-into-plastic-pollution-with-plastic-devouring-enzyme-investment.html

- CNN en Español segment (Sept 2022):

‍ ‍https://cnnespanol.cnn.com/video/contaminacion-plastico-cientifico-venezolano-metodo-para-desintegrarlo-camilo-egana-cnn/

- TV3 / Tot es mou, Equiplast Barcelona (2023):

‍ ‍https://www.3cat.cat/3cat/la-reformulacio-dels-plastics-u-ntema-central-al-salo-expoquimia/video/6223589/

- Patents (full list) — Justia:

‍ ‍https://patents.justia.com/inventor/manuel-rendon

- Example granted patent (US 9,181,412) — Google Patents:

‍ ‍https://patents.google.com/patent/US9181412

- Fabbaloo, TimeMass filaments incl. soap:

‍ ‍https://www.fabbaloo.com/news/timeplasts-3d-printable-soap-fire-plant-vitamin-and-light-transmitting-filaments

- Tom's Hardware, sustainable 3D printing filaments:

‍ ‍https://www.tomshardware.com/best-picks/best-filaments-for-3d-printing

- Packaging Europe Sustainability Awards 2021 finalists:

‍ ‍https://packagingeurope.com/announcement-sustainability-awards-2021-finalists/

- StartEngine $1M raise — Florida Politics:

‍ ‍https://floridapolitics.com/archives/579967-timeplast-startengine-campaign-lands-1m/