The gold of industrial trash cans

Direction the Autoroute du Soleil. Here, between the large sheet metal buildings, nestles a small space that could well change the daily life of the industry: that of Hubcycle. Julien Lesage, the founder, opens the doors of his company to us to tell us his story, which begins with a strange discovery.

In 2016, Julien Lesage was a trainee biochemist in the perfume factories of Grasse. There, his department manager entrusts him with the mission of extracting an anti-aging molecule from the famous May Rose. Industrial conventions then want the molecule to be taken from a sample of fresh roses. But it is in the floral waste generated by the factory that Julien will find his happiness. For him, it was the trigger: a product that was about to be thrown away has metamorphosed into a raw material. If this is the case for the May Rose, other industries can certainly follow the same path.

This discovery gives Julien the raison d'être of his future company: transform waste into raw materials. In the months that followed, Julien Lesage scoured the factories of France. He visits, analyzes, and exchanges with manufacturers. And thanks to these multiple immersions, his brilliant idea found its economic model. It identifies which industries generate what waste, how to exploit it, and who to sell it to. He launched Hubcycle, in order to create the missing bridge between manufacturers.

Entering his storage room, where hundreds of samples lie dormant, Julien Lesage shares a simple example: “Take an orange” he begins. “In its industrial process, it will be peeled and then pressed, its juice filtered and concentrated.” Result of the races: what is called the product represents 20% of the mass of the orange, the remaining 80% is thrown away. And it is precisely on this wasted mass that Hubcycle is working.

The role of the start-up is to identify the non-valued parts of the various industrial transformation cycles. Each unexploited commodity can represent a source of value for another industry. With this approach, peels, seeds or pulp are no longer considered waste, but as co-products: a commodity created during an industrial process that is useful in another processing chain. Once these co-products have been identified, it is the turn of the integrated laboratory to find a second life for them. Here, in the hands of the research teams, banana skin becomes the texturing agent of a vegan steak, and flaxseed flour is used in the composition of a low-fat vinaigrette.

The miracle in this case is that there is something for everyone. Hubcycle succeeded in Making recycling interesting from a financial point of viewr, by buying co-products that are up to 10 times more expensive than traditional waste recovery channels. For the manufacturer who buys processed products, the offer is just as attractive, because ingredients made from co-products are on average 20% cheaper than their equivalents from the traditional industry. An economic boon, but also on the environmental level, since, as Julien recalls, “We work with materials that are already produced, so that do not need to emit more CO2”.

In the food industry, almost half of the mass of raw materials used in an industrial process is discarded. A striking observation, which has a heavy impact on the environment. Globally, the agricultural sector accounts for 16% of greenhouse gas emissions. “If you throw away half, it means that a tenth of global CO2 emissions are useless, it's huge,” says Julien.

In summary, the initiative brilliantly solves an economic equation without emitting CO2 and by reducing food waste. With such a track record, why didn't manufacturers think of it sooner? Probably because of the very structure of the food industry, which is an obstacle to transversality between industrial actors.

Building bridges between industries is not that easy. The quality standards in the agri-food sector are very strict. One of the most common principles in the sector is the concept of “moving forward”, according to which “clean” food does not meet “dirty” food. This vertical organization reduces the risks of deterioration of the finished product as much as possible by eliminating waste as quickly as possible. Exploiting, processing and selling these foodstuffs therefore means questioning the industrial model as it has always existed.

This is the main challenge that the company must meet: to exploit these co-products without overturning established industrial models. To do this, you need an excellent knowledge of the world of industry and a great deal of adaptability to standards. Julien specifies that “neither the supplier nor the customer can guarantee the quality of such a commodity.” The team therefore makes sure to collect, treat and distribute its products in strict compliance with health standards. Thus, ingredients made from co-products can be re-injected into the market, like any conventional commodity.

Many major food groups have already placed their trust in the young company. The order book was gradually filling up, which attracted investors, and allowed the company to raise 5 million euros from Citizen Capital, Bleu Capital, Daphni and SWEN Capital Partners. For the time being, Hubcycle is focused on the many challenges that lie ahead. In fact, industrial culture cannot be transformed in two years. “Otherwise, we would be sold-out in 48 hours,” jokes Julien.

Despite a context of health crisis and the Russian-Ukrainian conflict that have damaged the industrial and agri-food sectors in recent years, the results obtained by the company so far are more than encouraging. If Hubcycle has succeeded in developing under such circumstances, we can only be optimistic, and tell ourselves that the circular economy has a bright future ahead of it...