Pioneer in ecological insulation wins Limburg Innovation Award 2024

Things are moving fast for Aerobel. After the Genk-based company previously won the Limburg Export Prize and the Award for Limburg Young Entrepreneur of the Year, it now also takes home the Limburg Innovation Award. The producer of innovative and ecological insulation materials outperformed ZF Wind Power and ABN Cleanroom Technology.

Sam Chartouni

• Age: 31 years
• Years as managing director: 4
• Life motto: "The ones who are crazy enough to think that they can change the world, are the ones who do!"

With the Innovation Award, Voka – KvK Limburg, together with VLAIO and the Province of Limburg, rewards a Limburg company as a leader in innovation. The jury chose Aerobel as the winner from three finalists. The company convinced the jury with their strong focus on reusing waste streams and minimizing chemical burden. Aerobel also combines innovation and circularity with an ambitious growth plan.

Symbiosis of Innovation and Sustainability

In a world where climate challenges are growing, Aerobel offers hopeful solutions. The Genk-based company is an example of the powerful symbiosis between innovation and sustainability. The scale-up specializes in developing innovative and sustainable raw materials for insulation materials. Under the leadership of CEO Sam Chartouni and CTO Steve De Pooter, Aerobel has covered an impressive trajectory in just four years.

Aerobel's bio-based raw materials and materials are transforming the entire sector, contributing to the transition to a more sustainable future. "We wanted to turn the insulation market upside down and prove that sustainability and commercial success can go hand in hand," says Sam Chartouni. With their unique technologies, they are convincingly succeeding. Even the largest industrial players have now become customers.

From Garage Lab to Industry

The story of Aerobel reads like the origin story of tech giants Microsoft and Apple. Here too, it all starts very modestly in the garage. Sam, a driven Innovation Management student, builds a small lab there and starts experimenting. "During my studies, I had become a self-employed consultant for a number of production companies. Through reverse engineering, I researched the chemical composition of their products. I came to the conclusion that they were anything but sustainable and decided to develop something better myself."

An intense period, Sam recalls. "During the day I did experiments in my lab, in the evening I was reading studies, and on weekends I went to work extra shifts in hospitality to still earn some money." After eighteen months of experimenting with sustainable materials, the gods smiled upon him and a first invention followed. This led to the development of bio- and waste-based adhesives and insulation materials with exceptional properties.

A key moment was the collaboration with Dr. Steve De Pooter, a researcher with a track record at KU Leuven and MIT Boston. Together they laid the foundation for Aerobel's success as founders and co-shareholders. In the meantime, the company has developed five patented technologies and has a high production capacity. "From the start, we began generating revenue. We thus proved that we not only had a good idea, but could also handle execution on an industrial scale," says Sam.

Circular and Innovative Materials

Aerobel's products excel through their technical and ecological performance. They are up to 35% more efficient than traditional insulation materials, water-repellent, fire-resistant, and also acoustically insulating. Moreover, they are produced from waste streams such as silica-rich glass waste, which fits perfectly into a circular model.

An example is their aerogel, a hyper-advanced insulation material that originally comes from space technology.

Aerobel managed to optimize the production process, causing the price to drop drastically and making the material accessible for broader applications. "We use 30 times fewer chemicals than competitors and avoid toxic substances. That makes our product not only environmentally friendly, but also economically attractive," Sam explains.

The versatility means it can be applied in various markets, such as the construction sector. "The aerogel is used there for coatings, which with extremely thin layers are still very insulating," Sam indicates. "But our material also finds its way into the pharmaceutical industry and the textile sector. Think, for example, of high-quality jackets that are simultaneously lightweight, water-repellent, and thermally insulating."

International Ambitions

Aerobel's growth doesn't stop in Flanders. With projects in Germany, Poland, and even Australia, the scale-up is expanding rapidly. "Poland is an important growth market for us. The construction sector there is enormous and offers a lot of potential for our products," says Sam. The international expansion brings both opportunities and challenges. "We've learned that being locally present and having a reliable network are essential for success," Sam emphasizes. "In Poland, for example, we have a local sales representative, and that's paying off. Our focus is currently on Europe, but we see Australia as a good test market for the US, where we'd also like to go someday."

For further internationalization, Aerobel can count on the support of an external shareholder. "The Belgian building materials group Fedrus invested in our growth plans. With a lot of expertise in the construction sector and a CEO with a backpack full of experience, they help us make the right strategic choices. These partnerships help not only to optimize logistics processes, but also to gain access to new markets." "We're proud of our Flemish roots, but we also look further. Our ambition is to set a worldwide standard in sustainable insulation materials."

"We're proud of our Flemish roots, but our ambition reaches further: an international standard in sustainable insulation."

Innovation Award as Recognition

The fact that this ambition and focus on innovation is now also being rewarded with an Innovation Award gives great satisfaction. "It's been a crazy journey," Sam looks back. "We're in full growth mode, looking for new international customers. Every day here is very busy and hectic. I submitted our file just before the deadline from abroad. Then followed a pitch for an extensive jury and later I received the message that we were among the three selected."

When Sam heard Aerobel announced as the winner at the ceremony, he was still surprised. "I indeed hadn't expected it, although I naturally hoped so. The two co-candidates are large established companies, while we're still a very young company. Although we're now also growing strongly and the Innovation Award is tailor-made for us."

"Everything we do is innovative," Sam explains, "including how we manage our company. We started from zero and grew very fast. From a garage-lab to industrial scale in four years is quite something. And that with five different products. We always go to market as quickly as possible with a minimum viable product aimed at early adopters. That's all textbook innovation management. That speed of development is what really makes us unique. I'm therefore proud of this award, it's an enormous boost for the organization and recognition. Both for Steve's R&D team, where they work on new inventions every day, and for production, where Benoît successfully runs all operations."

"We wanted to turn the insulation market upside down and prove that sustainability and commercial success can go hand in hand."

Looking to the Future

All those awards also turn out to be good for business. "As a startup, it's important to win the trust of the really large companies," Sam emphasizes. "The more awards we win, the more attention we get and the more impact we can generate with our products. Every prize brings us new customers. Partnerships with large industrial companies can truly transform the sector. Our strategy change from system supplier to raw materials producer and supplier also creates more impact."

2025 promises to be a crucial year for Aerobel. "We want to gain a foothold in new markets with that strategy," says Sam. The demand for environmentally friendly building materials is increasing strongly. To support that growth, we currently have ten vacancies in R&D, sales, and operations. At the same time, we want to maintain our startup mentality. We're going to develop the right strategies to preserve our innovation culture and create as much impact as possible."

Ecosystem

In Limburg, things are moving, but according to Sam, it could be even more. "The more invested in startups and scale-ups in Limburg, the better. Because innovation is one of the biggest employers at the moment. We need to stimulate and support that. The great talents are at the universities. We need to steer them more towards entrepreneurship to close the gap between the academic world and industry. In the Netherlands, they're doing well in this regard. We ourselves have an office and a lab at the Brightlands Chemelot Campus in Geleen. That's a chemistry and technology hub with a fantastic mix between education, startups, and mature companies. We need to stimulate that cross-pollination even more in Limburg."

Sustainability for Aerobel also has a strong social component. "For us, it's not just about developing environmentally friendly products and reusing materials. We stand for a culture where people are central. Employees spend the largest part of their lives at work. It's our responsibility to offer them an environment where they feel good and can flourish," Sam concludes.

Read the original article in Dutch at voka.be