With nearly €95 million raised to date, French startup Fairmat is a top contender in advanced material recycling. Its latest round of funding, a Series B led by French climatetech VC Slate and Bpifrance, is yet another endorsement for its combination of DeepTech innovation and circular manufacturing.
It certainly helped that Fairmat itself is only four years old, but its founder and CEO, Ben Saada, is not a newcomer in the carbon fiber composites industry — nor in making an impact through technology.
For the Selected podcast, I caught up with him at the 60th edition of JEC World, where he is no stranger either, and where Fairmat had a particularly noticeable booth this year, helping it conduct more than 100 meetings during the global trade show.
Making planes lighter
Right after engineering school, Ben launched Expliseat, a startup that was awarded the JEC Europe Innovation Award 2014 for having created the lightest airplane seat in the world, thanks to the use of composite and titanium.
This was not only an engineering feat, but also one that had the potential to significantly reduce the airlines’ environmental footprint. “This was a revolutionary seat, allowing airlines to save roughly 2 to 4% of fuel,” Ben said.
The DeepTech moat
In the words of Ben, “a DeepTech startup is a company where the technology itself represents a huge part of your investment.” This might be scary to investors, but maybe it shouldn’t be: Once the technology is proven, it represents a significant moat.
“After 14 years, my seat business still does not have any competitors in the lightweight seat segment,” he said of Expliseat, which he ran for almost 12 years before leaving the commands to its former COO, Amaury Barberot.
Ben giving up his seat wasn’t out of distaste for the aerospace industry, where he still thinks it is important to make progress: “Anything you do that truly reduces CO2 emissions is good for the planet.” But the realization that a huge quantity of advanced materials are going to waste was too big to ignore, and inspired him to launch Fairmat.
Recycling advanced materials
That advanced materials often end up in landfills or incinerated is sad, but hardly surprising; the reason they are valuable in the first place is that they are typically resistant to heat and chemicals, which make them impossible to recycle with traditional methods.
This is where Fairmat comes in, with an innovative method that combines a mechanical process — six-axis robots that slice materials into chips — with advanced software that recombines these chips into new materials.
Unlike some recycling byproducts, Fairmat’s materials are high value, too; it recently unveiled high-performance material called FairPly, which was tailored to address the needs of large industries. Another big bonus point: FairPly can be recycled again, eventually making for an Infinite Recycling loop.
The applications, too, are almost infinite. Fairmat’s first products were sporting goods, with partners such as Decathlon and DPS Skis, because the production cycles are short. But in the longer term, it also has a huge potential in the automotive industry, for instance.
Local and global
Fairmat’s connection to skiing is one reason why its second factory outside of France is in Salt Lake City. It also reflects its goal to be where its clients are. “We believe people will need more and more materials from local sources,” Ben said.
That’s why Fairmat is already looking beyond France and the U.S. “We are also seeking an opportunity in Asia to keep helping our customers’ base get local materials more and more.”
This also reflects the positioning adopted by this B Corp; it’s no accident that “fair” is part of its name. “And we want [this fairness] to be established in every aspect of our work life,” Ben said. This applies to the planet, of course, but also to its employees.
Gore-Tex and the power of a strong brand
Mission aside, Fairmat’s brand has certainly helped the company attract talent. Most companies in the new materials space are invisible, but not Fairmat. According to Ben, the company is taking after Gore-Tex on that front.
“When you buy a Gore-Tex jacket, you know that it is probably better than the one next to it that is not Gore-Tex. Our goal is very clear: We want people to know that when they buy a product built with Fairmat, it’s a better product than if it’s not built with Fairmat, so we try to be visible as much as possible.”
Being visible also includes Fairmat’s event strategy. In addition to its noticeable presence at JEC World 2025, it recently held its own keynote event at no less than the Eiffel Tower. Watch the video here:
