The Competitive Edge: Carbiolice

Q: What was the reason for founding your organization – what was the open niche you saw that could be addressed with a new product or service? What was the problem, or gap, or opportunity?

Carbiolice is a joint-venture established in 2016 that is based on the shared and complementary ambitions of Carbios, a green chemical company developing enzymatic technologies; of the SPI investment fund operated by Bpifrance; and Limagrain Céréales Ingrédients, a subsidiary of the world-renowned cooperative Limagrain.

Carbiolice is a French company with expertise in the development and manufacture of 100% compostable and 100% biodegradable bioplastics.

Its aim is to design, manufacture and distribute biodegradable solutions which can be used to redesign the life cycle of single-use plastics and packaging articles to achieve zero waste and provide an answer to sustainable development issues.

Q: Tell us about your organization. What do you do?

Carbiolice has developed a disruptive solution based on an innovative technology using enzymes to speed up compostability and biodegradability of PLA plastics.

Developed as an additive, Evanestoa can be used on conventional plastic transforming processes without adaptation.

This innovative additive is best suited for applications such as single-use plastics, in which compostability and biodegradability are a meaningful end-of-life. It can be used to make products 100% compostable and 100% biodegradable. Evanestoa performance has been successfully demonstrated on thin films and sheets, by tests performed by OWS under domestic composting conditions according to NF T51-800.

Ready to reach the market in early 2020, Evanestoa is intended for various uses such as bags, packaging disposable tableware.

Q: What stage of development are you?

Demonstration stage – proven at small, integrated scale, but not yet commercially available

Q: What do your technologies, products or services do and accomplish – how does it (they) work, who is it (they) aimed for?

Relying on Carbios exclusive license on enzyme self-degrading enzyme PLA plastic materials, Carbiolice has designed an unique formulation protecting the enzymatic activity when the additive is added to conventional plastic transforming processes.

Just like a regular additive, this technological concentrate is added to compound having a high PLA content during the transforming process whether it is blown film extrusion, thermoforming or injection molding.

Our additive enables to fasten the biodegradation process and makes PLA plastics, 100% biodegradable and 100% compostable in domestic conditions. A combination of conditions (pH, temperature, humidity, and presence of microorganisms) activates the enzyme which then acts as a catalyst, making PLA compliant with current home composting standards both in terms of duration and quality of the compost created.

Q: Competitively, what gives your technology, product or service set an edge in cost

or performance, sustainability, or any other aspect, that makes it stand out from the crowd, In short, what makes it transformative?

In order to solve the general concern of plastic pollution, all existing solutions should be combined and are complementary. Carbiolice is convinced that composting plastics in home conditions is one of the solutions to improve the transition to a circular plastic economy. Starting from the principle that what has come from nature returns to nature, Carbiolice gives the opportunity to single-use plastics such as tableware, coffee caps, packaging to be organically recycled together with food waste.

Because 30% of our global waste are biowaste, developing home composting will significantly reduce volumes of consumer waste to be treated.

By making single-use plastics made with PLA compostable in domestic conditions, Evanestoa offers a new area for plastics end-of life.

Q: What are the 3 top milestones you have accomplished in the past 3 years?

1. Development of a formulation, directly usable by plastic converters, using the exclusive license from Carbios on enzymes self-degrading PLA plastic materials.

2. Demonstration of performance on both flexible and rigid applications.

3. Signature of an exclusive supply agreement with Novozymes, world-leading producer of enzymes, for the production and supply of enzymes for the manufacture of self-degrading PLA plastics.

Q: What are the 3 top milestones you will accomplish in the next 3 years?

1. Sell Evanestoa, our enzymatic additive, at the beginning of 2020.

2. Obtain food contact approval in order to expand applications and product coverage.

3. Develop the next generation of additive to further improve performance on high-demanding processes.

1. Where can I learn more about Carbiolice?

Click here to visit Carbiolice’s website.