Adrien welcomes Antoine Welter, co-founder and CEO of Circu Li-ion. A driven impact entrepreneur at heart, Antoine walks Adrien through the whole process that led him to quit his consulting job to found the Luxembourg-based battery upcycling start-up with his co-founder and CTO, Xavier Kohll. During the conversation, Antoine brings up the highly debated myth of urban mining, which consists of re-using raw materials from waste, and argues that this is something humanity can achieve as demonstrated by his own venture.
They then dive into the difference between running a software business which has dominated trends over the past decade versus addressing real economy issues via the hardware route such as Circu Li-ion's. For Antoine, hardware solutions address crucial environmental issues, making them essential in the transition to a sustainable and circular economy.
Adrien enquires about the expectations that his investors have given the nature of the business, and how they get benchmarked in terms of profitability metrics.
Another important aspect of the business model lies in Circu Li-ion's ability to collect data from partners and customers to improve their machine as a service offering. Utilising AI and machine learning is crucial for efficiently recognizing and handling a wide range of battery types, contributing to resource efficiency. Here, the Luxembourg supercomputer, Meluxina, comes into play to enable this.
Finally, they talk about the challenges the Luxembourg economy faces, knowing that it has moved away from the industrial policy templates in favour of the services-based economy.