Grabity StraightMAX: A More healthy, Science-Backed Option to Straighten Hair

For many years, individuals with curly or tightly coiled hair have confronted the identical problem: find out how to obtain glossy, straight kinds with out damaging their hair. Conventional straightening therapies typically depend on harsh chemical compounds, together with formaldehyde, thioglycolates, and sodium hydroxide. Whereas efficient, these substances typically include critical downsides—scalp irritation, lasting harm to hair fibers, and even publicity to probably poisonous fumes. The sweetness trade has lengthy looked for a safer various.

Polyphenol Manufacturing unit, a Korean beauty-tech startup, believes it has discovered the reply. At CES 2026, the corporate will current Grabity StraightMAX, a hair-straightening expertise powered by naturally derived polyphenols. Not like chemical relaxers, StraightMAX doesn’t break the hair’s inner disulfide bonds. As an alternative, it makes use of plant-based polyphenol polymers to coat the hair floor with an invisible layer. When heated and dried, this exterior layer reshapes the hair shaft, reworking even tight curls into clean, straight kinds in only one or two makes use of.

What makes StraightMAX particularly modern is its twin functionality. The identical molecular precept that straightens hair may also be reversed to create waves or gentle curls, turning it into a flexible styling platform. The result’s glossy, shiny hair that continues to be gentle and pure to the contact—removed from the stiff, brittle outcomes of standard therapies. Importantly, the impact lasts till the subsequent shampoo, that means customers can get pleasure from skilled outcomes at residence with out committing to everlasting change.

Hair straightening has been dominated by salon perms and keratin therapies. These strategies require lengthy classes {of professional} software. StraightMAX sidesteps all of those points. Utility is easy: relying on hair kind, customers can select between a sprig for looser curls or a cream for very tight, water-repellent hair. After making use of and drying, the hair holds its new form with out additional effort and retains a pure texture (in contrast to when utilizing gels).

Professor Haeshin Lee of KAIST

The expertise builds on greater than a decade of analysis by Professor Haeshin Lee of KAIST, one of many world’s prime scientists in bio-inspired supplies. His lab has pioneered adhesives impressed by marine mussels, which may bond even in moist circumstances. That very same precept now powers StraightMAX’s polyphenol coating, enabling it to connect securely to hair regardless of the presence of water. The polyphenols themselves are sustainably sourced from agricultural by-products equivalent to walnut shells and inexperienced tea leaves, giving the product an eco-friendly dimension.

Polyphenol Manufacturing unit isn’t any stranger to client success. Its first product, Grabity anti-hair-loss shampoo, grew to become a sensation in Korea, promoting 1.4 million bottles inside a yr of launch and topping charts at Olive Younger (a beauty chain) and Naver (Korea’s main search engine). The corporate has since expanded internationally to Japan, the U.S., Taiwan, and Europe.

With StraightMAX, it’s concentrating on markets the place curly hair is most prevalent—North and Latin America, Africa, and Southeast Asia—positioning the product as a safer, sustainable various to long-entrenched chemical straightening.

By combining cutting-edge biomaterials science with consumer-friendly design, StraightMAX factors towards a future the place magnificence routines will be each efficient and protected.

Filed in Medical. Learn extra about CES, CES 2026, Healthcare and Korea.