JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #102 - January/February 2016 - 20

CFRP

interview

Michel Costes,
CEO,
Inovev

JEC Composites Magazine: Could you describe Inovev's activities in a few words?

Michel Costes : Inovev is a world-

wide platform for automotive professionals
who design and engineer vehicles and
systems: carmakers and their supply chains.
It is based on an Internet core platform but
works in strong connection with traditional
"brick and mortar" tools.
It has two main functions:
1) Provide Inovev's customers with information and analyses relating to the market
and technologies. Market: all data relating
to registrations and production, as well
as in-depth trend analyses. Technologies:
automotive innovations from the whole
world.
2) Enable Inovev's customers to promote their own innovations, so that they
can develop new businesses much more
efficiently and at a cost quite lower than by
using traditional tools.
The Internet platform may replace traditional tools or complement them.

JCM: How do you develop a response to
your customer's needs?

M.C.: First, we listen attentively to

the needs of our customers, which are
various. Then, we examine with them the
most effective ways to use our platform's
functionalities.
Our platform is a chameleon platform that
adapts itself to the precise needs of our
customers. It has been developed over the
last four years, taking advantage of the automotive experience of the Inovev executive
team, which has analysed the automotive
industry (during 4 decades for the senior

team member and one decade for the
youngest one).
This team is composed of economists,
engineers and IT managers.
In addition to the use of our platform, we
ensure our customers benefit from our
comprehensive worldwide contact network
as well as our presence at major events
such as JEC or the Yokohama Automotive
Engineering Exhibition.
JCM: What is your experience
in the automotive industry?

M.C.: Our management team is com-

posed of five people: four with experience
in the automotive industry and one as
IT director. This team has been working
together for the last 10 years.
More specifically regarding my own experience, we can say that I am an automotive
man.
For the last four decades, I have been
working to support the development of an
efficient, sustainable automotive industry.
I started my career as an intern in Renault
and worked 12 years with carmakers
(Citroen, Peugeot, PSA and Renault) and
their suppliers before founding my first
company in 1994, the Mavel company,
which became a worldwide leader in automotive benchmarking. In 1998, I founded
Nexiel, an Internet company. In 2010, I
closed Mavel and founded Inovev in order
to implement a new business model more
adapted to the new economy.

JCM: Do composite materials have
assets to put forward?

M.C.: The answer is undoubtedly: yes,

they have!
They cumulate many advantages: they are
light and resistant; they offer more freedom
to designers and they can be combined
with other materials.
They are already well established in automotive construction. New trends in the
automotive industry - the need for weight
saving and new shapes - will push them
forward in the future.

20 jec composites magazine / No102 January - February 2016

JCM: How do you feel about a real breakthrough of composite materials in the
future?

M.C.: In Europe, composite materials

started to be used in mass production at
the beginning of the 70's with the Renault
R5, a vehicle with bumpers made of SMC.
SMC experienced continuous growth
from the beginning of the 70's to the end
of the 90's. It was the golden age of automotive SMC. Then, SMC had to compete
with other designs. Since the beginning of
the 2000's, GFRP (glass fibre-reinforced
plastics) have been used for diverse applications such as floors and hatchbacks, but
not systematically.
Then in 2015, German premium carmakers started to use CFRP (carbon fibrereinforced plastics). The application of
CFRP might increase significantly but on
the condition that their costs are drastically reduced.

JCM: You have strong contacts with
carmakers. Could you tell us what they
expect from these materials?

M.C.: We see, in particular, the following
expectations:

- Cost reductions: carmakers are expecting cost reductions all along the supply
chain:
- Fibres: reduced cost of existing
fibres (GF and CF), with possible
new chemistry (change of
precursors for CF), new types of
fibres.
- Resins and processes: use of new
types of thermoplastics (fluids and
reactive).
Development of new processes
such as fast RTM. Reduced
production scrap.
- Automation: at all the stages of
manufacture.
- Recycling: in production.
- Efficient ways to assembly composite
parts with any other part, whatever the
materials used for this part.
- Recycling after use.
- Cosmetics. n

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #102 - January/February 2016