French Afyren starts production of bio-acids – CEO in interview

Background Interview

European Biotechnology News spoke to Nicolas Sordet, CEO of AFYREN SA in Clermont-Ferrand/Lyon. He has worked for over a decade in building up a production plant for biobased chemicals from non-food biomass. His mantra is, to be competitive from the start. AFYREN´s plant is up and running and industry cooperations are now the proof of a new business model.

EuroBiotech: Mr. Sordet, you co-started AFYREN more than a decade ago. Can you review those early days?

Nicolas Sordet: Before AFYREN, I used to work in finance, had I known more about the biotech industry, I would have been more scared perhaps, but that is another story. I was in Finance Business globally, also in Hong-Kong, and came back to France and was thinking about what to do next. The two scientists behind the project approached me to engage in a Greentech project for sustainable hydrogen. But this was not a good idea with respect to competitiveness, and we switched soon to chemical products from secondary feedstock. I was 100% enthusiastic but not knowing much about the industry, I wanted to do something more concrete and purposeful.

EuroBiotech: What were you aiming at?

Sordet: I accepted the challenge in 2012/13. We wanted to use all the farming/agricultural waste not for producing biogas like many others, but to extract chemical substances which are normally produced by big chemistry companies, like Dupont and others from petrol/fossil sources in the most unsustainable way you can imagine. We wanted to use fermentation to develop new biobased acids. A market that is about US$50bn worldwide.

EuroBiotech: As your background is financing, what was your perspective on this endeavor?

Sordet: We wanted to do it differently, sustainably, but it was clear, that we can only convince new partners with competitive costs. We are using a biomimetic approach without genetic engineering and use of a mix of microbes that produce a mix of biobased acids from various renewable feedstocks. We don’t rely on single a feedstock or single microbes as producers. Without wasting anything of used resources, this also helps in reducing the costs of goods.

EuroBiotech: Can you elaborate on your technological approach a bit?

Sordet: We are using agriculture/farming byproducts, “waste” as some might call it -no direct food biomass-and then we apply natural fermentation. The key is our innovative process and our high flexibility to address after market demands. No restriction to a special chemistry field or industry at all. We started like everybody else at lab scale, then we moved to pilot and demonstrator scale. Now we have built our own plant, close to the German border. We are now working in several product-lines and have contracts of about €165m in place.

EuroBiotech: Is your business model licensing or producing in your own plant(s)?

Sordet: We want to build and run the plant. In my opinion, the licensing model of a technology is not working for a start-up in industrial biotechnology. Of course, up scaling is the major step for a new player in industry, and it takes a huge amount of money. That´s why many are preferring to give a license. But you do not see a lot of success and growth of start-ups relying on this model.

EuroBiotech: Why is that?

Sordet: We always believed we have to keep the technology with us and must have a fully functioning plant of our own. The value is in what we are doing. And the proof of your model is, that there is interest in your production scheme before you build the plant. You must have demonstrated that the product is competitive or even better than current industrial processes in the fossil fuel chemistry industry. And you must be convinced that scaling up to really large production capacities is not a problem. There is the cherry on the cake and there is no way around this.

EuroBiotech: Your international project After-Biochem with the German company Südzucker and others is in itself sustainable. On project completion, your cooperation was prolonged. How did this work?

Sordet: This is an example, of how we approach the industrialization. We wanted to be a sustainable company, so we had to set up the biobased projects in our hands to prove success. The commercial partners helped us in the challenge, they believed in us even while some things took longer, but all our partners took the challenge of circularity and low carbon very serious.

EuroBiotech: The times are still difficult for non-fossil biobased production; the environment changes a lot in different countries around the globe. Money is the limiting factor. How do you see the environment?

Sordet: It´s a challenge, no doubt. For example, as the US stopped financing such projects, a lot of the start-ups collapsed. It is the same with some European projects where you always have the danger that they are running out of money before the young industry can complete development or partner at industrial scale. But we have to be serious about our promise to making industry more sustainable. The low carbon approach is not to make higher profits and get a premium, but to change the market and offer traditional industry players an entrance door to transform into sustainability in a similar cost environment. That is the only convincing argument.

EuroBiotech: But the traditional industry tends to stick to their traditional process. Do you see a shift in the mindset, or is the pendulum swinging back again?

Sordet: Its like the Kodak story. Old companies may have gained a dominant market position and are of course not happy if new players are coming in. But if the new wave is getting bigger, at one point you are missing out completely or you have to change and move. We have now built our company Afyren for over 13 years, so we are not so new anymore. And we have seen and learned a lot on this winding road, and many have seen us developing step by step.

EuroBiotech: Is the market ready for your products. Is this a push or a pull market?

Sordet: We still have to compete against petro-based industry who have optimized their process for decades and have a wonderful resource in terms of thermo-energy content. Pretty efficient, the machine is running on very low costs if you exclude the costs to environment. You have to demonstrate to be competitive, or you are just doing science. Biotech industry is Capex intensive, but we are here for another decades, it is another longtime investment. You can be successful, otherwise I would not talk to you. There is a lack of money of course, and a lot of companies have to close down. And we are absolutely missing a financing model like in pharma. The rate of success is pretty low until now. The exit door is not existing as in pharma, so you have fewer investors. Europe is helping here through EIB to get you growing from R+D to pre-industry scale. But when you have proof of concept, then there is no big player stepping in. You have to work on bridging this gap on your own.

EuroBiotech: Financing is key, but the amount of money needed is huge. Which resources of financing are available?

Sordet: You need a mixture of financing resources. And to be clear, building an industrial production plant is in the middle of the usual players. For VCs our investment volume is too high and the time to return is longer than any fund is running. For private equity it would be fitting, but they want cash flow to do their investment, which you do not have in the very beginning. You stick right in the middle. We were lucky to find Sofinnova Partners as our lead VC, who were eager to develop the bioeconomy industry in a newly set up fund. Then the EU released the SDG goals, sustainability became an asset class. The SDG made a big wave on investors, and we took this window of opportunity just in time for our IPO. Just a few months later, this window closed and within the last 3 years rather nothing has happened anymore.

EuroBiotech: So you were lucky with a mix of financing. But the stock market is not easy too, your listing is not a shining starlight of a success story so far, why?

Sordet: At the time of our IPO we needed new financing and nothing else seemed to work out. The capital influx helped us to prepare the installation of our own production plant. We are the only player to have a plant up and running. We believe we can grow substantially as we have a lot of customers already on starting phase of our new industrial phase. Now, we are one of the very early projects in industrial scale and we are very flexible to produce the biobased ingredients from our fermentation process that the market needs. All these early investments made it happen, where we stand now. Our story is ready for now a new growth phase.

EuroBiotech: You stand at a tipping point for Afyren?

Sordet: Yes, we are at the turning point. Scaling to industrial level is tough work for a small company. The management has to learn and do many different things in the same moment. Technologically, scientifically, the business model has to be in place, but you must keep an eye on the environment and markets. Just think about the staffing, we must find the right people that can take an enormous amount of risk on their shoulders. Without an entrepreneurial spirit in your whole team, you cannot make it. Europe is still leading the field in industrial biotechnology, but the bigger plants may be built somewhere else. We must build and run them, that is the mission of our company. To be there, where the resource for our fermentation process is, and to use this to get green chemistry products.

EuroBiotech: If you have a free wish, what would it be for the industry sector?

Sordet: The pharma model is missing! Our ecosystem is not yet organized like in pharma. The companies are more cautious, and the successes are much too few. Bioindustry needs the pharma model. If nobody is closing the loop, we have a problem. If the big industry does not invest, the start-ups will go bankrupt, but their innovation will be missing. The big companies have to move in now to gain all the speed and momentum from the innovators.  

The interview was conducted early in June 2025 with Georg Kääb. The story around the many bio-based projects in Europe with a special focus on the success of Afyren is part of issue 2-25 of European Biotechnology News Magazine, published End of June 25. Comments to the author:    g.kaeaeb@biocom.eu