Benjamin Saada spent years designing lighter aircraft seats before confronting an uncomfortable truth: the carbon fiber that made those seats possible had nowhere to go when they wore out. Five years after founding Fairmat to solve that problem, the Paris-based recycling startup has closed a €61 million Series B—money it says will help scale a technology the composites industry desperately needs but hasn't quite figured out how to pay for.
The latest €10 million extension, disclosed in November, came from Infinity Recycling's Circular Plastics Fund, a Luxembourg vehicle focused on closing loops in plastic waste streams. It follows an April close that brought in €51.5 million: €26.5 million in equity co-led by Bpifrance Large Venture and Slate VC, plus a €25 million venture loan from the European Investment Bank. Cape Capital joined that round alongside earlier backers Singular, Temasek, CNP, and Pictet Group.
Not exactly a household name yet. But Fairmat is tackling a waste problem most people never see, even as it grows: an estimated 138 million tons of carbon fiber composites headed for landfills over the next 50 years. Wind turbine blades alone are becoming a disposal headache—massive, long-lived structures that utilities don't know how to dismantle economically. Add in aircraft parts, luxury sporting goods, and automotive components, and you have an industrial paradox. The materials are prized for being nearly indestructible. Which is precisely why they're nearly impossible to recycle.
Cracking a Stubborn Material
Fairmat's approach splits the problem in two. First, robotic systems chop composite waste into chips—straightforward enough. The harder part comes next: stripping away the resin that binds carbon fibers together without destroying the fibers themselves. That's where Fairmat's patented cold atmospheric plasma process enters. The company brands it "Infinity Recycling," a nod to the idea that once you've separated the materials cleanly, you can theoretically recycle them indefinitely.
Whether that holds true at commercial scale remains to be seen. But early customer traction suggests the business model might work. FairPly, Fairmat's laminated product line made from recycled chips, captured 50% of the order book within six months of launching, according to Bpifrance materials from April. The company now operates automated facilities in France and a 15,000-square-foot plant in Salt Lake City, opened in April 2024.
That Utah facility landed a meaningful anchor: a 10-year deal with Hexcel, a major composite manufacturer, to recycle production scrap. Other partnerships include Siemens Gamesa for turbine waste, Dassault Aviation for aerospace applications, and a June contract with Syensqo—the materials spinoff from Solvay—to process UK prepreg waste. DPS Skis even showcased products using Fairmat materials at a 2025 industry event, signaling the technology has moved beyond lab curiosities.
Where the Money Goes
The Series B capital targets three ambitions. Fairmat plans to triple manufacturing capacity at existing sites—a bold step that assumes demand will materialize. It's also eyeing international expansion beyond France and the U.S., though the company hasn't named specific markets yet. Perhaps most critically, the funding will support commercializing the full plasma recycling technology by 2027, the point at which Fairmat says it can recycle its own recycled materials indefinitely.
That 2027 timeline matters. Right now, Fairmat's business is essentially linear: take in composite waste, turn it into new products, sell it. Closing the loop—enabling true circularity—would represent a fundamental shift, though it also introduces new technical and economic challenges. Can the company maintain material quality through multiple recycling cycles? Will customers pay a premium for third- or fourth-generation recycled carbon fiber?
Saada, who co-founded aircraft seating company Expliseat before launching Fairmat in 2020, has framed the challenge in infrastructure terms. The circular supply chain his company envisions doesn't exist yet for high-performance composites at industrial scale. Building it will require more than technology—it needs willing partners, regulatory tailwinds, and sustained capital.
Fairmat now employs roughly 100 people and earned B Corporation certification in April 2024 with a score of 106, a respectable mark in sustainability circles. The broader sustainable materials market it's targeting was valued at $355.3 billion in 2024, according to figures Bpifrance cited, with projections reaching $692 billion by 2033.
Those numbers sound encouraging. But they also lump together wildly different materials—bioplastics, recycled metals, sustainable textiles—making it hard to gauge Fairmat's true addressable market. What's clearer is the problem itself: millions of tons of composite waste with few good disposal options. Whether Fairmat can turn that liability into a profitable business at scale is the bet investors are making now.
For Saada and his team, the immediate task is more prosaic: ramping up production, signing more customers, and proving the unit economics work. The vision of infinite recycling can wait. First, they need to show the first loop closes.
