At a press conference on Thursday, October 3rd, Luca de Meo, CEO of Renault Group, and Sabrina Soussan, Chairman and CEO of Suez, announced Suez had acquired a 20% stake in The Future Is NEUTRAL. Both partners have also laid the foundations to strengthen their cooperation in the automotive circular economy.
“The arrival of SUEZ in The Future Is NEUTRAL with us is further proof of the relevance of this model, which we have set up with the aim of offering all players in the automotive industry a multi-brand, open circular economy platform, in activities that are already growing. Our joint investment will provide concrete answers to the new challenges of the automotive sector by strengthening existing activities and creating new closed-loop recycling solutions, from automotive to automotive,” says Luca de Meo, CEO, Renault Group.
“By investing in The Future Is NEUTRAL alongside Renault Group, SUEZ is strengthening its ability to support players in the automotive industry as they drive their ecological transition. Securing supplies of secondary raw materials is a key challenge for the automotive sector in the coming years. Our expertise in the recycling and recovery of waste materials will enable us to support the sector's transformation towards greater circularity and reduce its dependence on virgin raw materials,” explains Sabrina Soussan, Chairman and CEO, SUEZ.
[insert photos of LDM & SS during press conference, cf Delphine Rosain]
Renault Group and Suez will each contribute their own expertise to the growth of The Future Is NEUTRAL. The aim? To enable the company to offer a complete range of recycled materials and remanufactured automotive parts, for the benefit of all players in the automotive industry, especially automakers and parts suppliers.
Suez will contribute its expertise in waste management - collection, mass sorting and material recovery - and its industrial capacity to produce homogeneous flows of recycled materials on a large scale. For its part, Renault Group is giving its subsidiary the benefit of its complete coverage of the automotive value chain, from vehicle design to end-of-life, its expertise in eco-design and its industrial base, the Flins Refactory.
The entry of SUEZ into the capital of The Future Is NEUTRAL marks a decisive step in our project to open up to the entire automotive industry. Thanks to the support of our two shareholders, we are confirming our growth plan to expand, massify and make our solutions even more competitive. Many of our activities that make up the value chain of the closed-loop automotive circular economy are already operational and profitable. We're working on integrating closed-loop battery recycling into this chain in the near future, and scaling it up to industrial scale, to support the European automotive industry in its transformation towards circularity.
In addition to Suez's entry into the capital of The Future Is NEUTRAL, the two partners have signed a cooperation agreement aimed at accelerating the automotive circular economy. The agreement covers several areas, including design for recyclability, reverse logistics, and automotive materials closed-loop recycling.
Initiated by Renault Group, The Future Is NEUTRAL brings comprehensive circular economy solutions to all players in the automotive sector, including automakers, parts manufacturers, distributors, insurers and private customers. These offers are adapted to each stage of the vehicle life cycle (recycled materials for production, reused, repaired or remanufactured parts, collection services, management and recovery of end-of-life vehicles, etc.).