BUSINESS 15102025

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00:00Segwaying into the business news now with Charles Pellegrin.

00:03Charles, you are focusing on a French startup today.

00:06That's right.

00:06This year's winner of the Ivy Tech Prize,

00:09which rewards France's Young Tech Entrepreneur of the Year,

00:11is Marius Amelot.

00:13He's the CEO and co-founder of Le Pavé,

00:15a company which transforms plastic waste

00:17into sustainable construction material.

00:20The company was created in 2019,

00:22now has two production sites in France

00:24and counts 36 employees.

00:25It's raised over 10 million euros in funding.

00:28Marius Amelot joins us on set now.

00:30Thanks for being with us, Marius.

00:32Thanks a lot.

00:34Let's begin with your actual process.

00:37You use plastic waste to create these new,

00:39quote-unquote, durable materials.

00:41So how do you do it?

00:42And what makes these new upcycled materials

00:45so sustainable or durable?

00:47So at Le Pavé, we are an industrial startup,

00:50which is specialized into the transformation

00:51of waste into panels.

00:53And in order to make that,

00:54we developed a really specific knowledge,

00:56industrial knowledge that we pattern.

00:58It's thermocompression.

01:00And so basically, we collect trash everywhere

01:02in France and in Europe.

01:04We collect some different kind of trash,

01:06like from fridge, but also ceramic trash

01:09that we compress, that we heat and cool down

01:12in order to transform it into panels

01:15without adding any resin.

01:16That's the main challenge,

01:18being able to transform 100% waste

01:20into sustainable product

01:22that has the same properties,

01:23technical properties as the standard materials.

01:26And that's what we are doing at Le Pavé.

01:28And where have your materials been used in real life?

01:31At the moment, we have been developing

01:34the technology for seven years.

01:35But meanwhile, we were developing the technology.

01:38We already managed to do some projects.

01:40We already did some like 2,300 projects.

01:43So we are used everywhere in Europe.

01:47And at the moment,

01:47we also have been involved in the Olympic Games,

01:50the previous one,

01:52in order to provide more than 10,000 seats

01:54for the Olympic pool.

01:56And we already recycled

01:58more than 1,000 tons of plastic.

02:00And we are at the specific moment,

02:02a turning point,

02:03because from like six months,

02:07we have now the capacity

02:08of transforming 2,000 tons

02:11of plastic waste every year.

02:13You mentioned plastic.

02:14And we see the pictures

02:15of all these plastic waste

02:16being cut into small pieces,

02:18which leads to a question

02:19a lot of people have when they see this.

02:21What's the consequence

02:23in terms of microplastics?

02:24How do you deal with that issue?

02:25Yeah.

02:26The way that we deal with microplastics

02:27is that we are developing massive material.

02:31It's not like recycling waste,

02:34plastic waste for the clothing and stuff.

02:36We are doing like plastic panels

02:38that are massive

02:40and that are not used

02:42as a specific way

02:46that would produce microplastic waste.

02:49Okay.

02:50Your processes also offer an opportunity

02:53to reduce carbon emissions.

02:55How so and to what extent?

02:57Yeah.

02:58So at the moment,

02:59we manage to divide the carbon emission by 10

03:01regarding the material that we are replacing.

03:04And that is enabled thanks to the fact

03:07that we are using mainly waste,

03:09like 100% waste without adding any resin,

03:11but also the fact that our industrial process

03:14is a really low energy consumer.

03:16Like we designed this process

03:18so that it does not have to be too high in temperature

03:22and it does not consume any type of gas energy

03:26or fuel energy.

03:27It's only electric energy.

03:28And that makes our material really sustainable

03:31and with really low needs in electric.

03:35You've really put forward in your materials

03:37you offer to the press and your clients

03:39the aesthetic value of your materials

03:41using all the different colors

03:43that are found in plastic.

03:44Tell us more about that aspect of your business.

03:46Yeah.

03:46We believe that the issue with plastic

03:49is not only the material,

03:50but it's mainly the fact

03:52that we don't manage to create value

03:54out of the trash.

03:55So at Le Pavé, we are working on two things,

03:58like being able to provide technical material

04:01that has a really good performance

04:03regarding the resistancy,

04:05but also an aesthetical value

04:07that enable our client to use our material

04:10as they would have done for the regular material.

04:14So we are playing with the aesthetic

04:15and that's allowed us to go further

04:18regarding our environmental impact

04:20because we are not only saving CO2,

04:22but we are also trying to explain

04:24what we are doing with our company,

04:27being able to collect trash locally

04:29to transform it without any resin

04:31and being able also to tell this story

04:33with beautiful materials.

04:36You're a young tech entrepreneur in France.

04:38You've gone through this adventure

04:40of starting this company.

04:41The big sort of issue of the day

04:43is how to operate in France currently

04:47amidst so much political instability

04:49over the past year.

04:50How has that impacted you?

04:51I mean, it impacts us.

04:54I think it impacts the whole economy.

04:57But for our field,

04:59we are like in the trash industry,

05:01in the building industry.

05:02It's two industries that are long-term industries.

05:06So the small change,

05:09like regarding the short term,

05:11does not impact us that much

05:13because we are focused on the long term

05:16and trying to develop something

05:17that could hold for decades.

05:18Marius Amelot,

05:20you are the CEO and co-founder

05:22of Le Pavé

05:23and the winner of this year's

05:24Ivy Tech Prize

05:25for the French Young Tech Entrepreneur

05:27of the Year.

05:27Thank you so much for speaking with us.

05:29Thanks a lot.

05:30And back to you, Karis.

05:31Thank you, Charles.

05:31And thank you, Marius.

05:32Congratulations again.

05:34Thank you to you for watching.

05:35We're going to be back

05:36after this short break.

05:37We'll be back after this short break.

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