Composite and reinforcement technology firms seem to be going through what can be dubbed a golden era, having emerged from a fallout from the coronavirus pandemic that plagued aviation and aerospace-related business after grounding planes around the world.

The global composite materials market had a market size of $71.12 billion in 2021, according to Vantage Market Research. It is expected to grow at an average annual rate of 7.5% between 2023 and 2028, reaching a market volume of $128.82 billion by 2028.

After the pandemic period, players in the aerospace and space composite materials market, who closely follow consumer behavior analysis and market dynamics, met at JEC World 2023 in Paris.

Composite and reinforcement materials supplier Kordsa, the main sponsor of JEC World 2023, exhibited the innovations of its subsidiaries, Fabric Development Inc. (FDI), Textile Products Inc. (TPI), Axiom Materials and Microtex Composites.

It also displayed the technologies developed at the Composite Technologies Center of Excellence (KTMM) located in Türkiye, which brings together product development, production and application under one roof.

Sabancı University also accompanied Kordsa at the fair with its academic perspective, knowledge and open innovation strategy.

Materials in the space

Kordsa CEO Ibrahim Özgür Yıldırım said the company is the only carbon fabric supplier of Boeing's B787 Dreamliner aircraft in North America with its composite production facilities in the U.S.

"During the pandemic period, while not even a single plane was taking off, we expanded the range of our products for the automotive industry. We started putting our eggs in different baskets. Our materials, which we produced on our 50th anniversary, went into space.

"The Orion capsule designed by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to transport astronauts broke the record for the farthest distance traveled by a spacecraft designed to transport humans with the support of the fabric produced by our company, Fabric Development Inc.," Yıldırım noted.

The Orion is a partially reusable crewed spacecraft designed for deep space exploration missions beyond low Earth orbit. It has been built to take humans farther into space than they've ever gone before.

In Europe, Yıldırım said they increased their competence in the composite field by adding Italian Microtex Composites, which mainly provides carbon fiber weaving and prepreg to the super-luxury automotive sector and motorsports, to their portfolio last year.

"With our production extending from America to the Asia-Pacific region, we will continue to offer our reinforcement technologies to the world. We aim to create value for all our stakeholders with global market leadership, technology leadership and sustainability leadership in all sectors we operate in. We also contribute to construction reinforcement with Kratos products," he noted.

13 production facilities

Yıldırım said JEC World 2023 was fruitful for them, stressing Kordsa is the leading advanced materials company in the world with 13 production facilities, two research and development (R&D) centers, and 4,900 employees spread across six countries.

"We continue on our path of producing and developing future materials, taking strong steps toward our vision of "strengthening life" in our tire, construction and composite business sectors for future generations through our developed technologies," he noted.

"We are focused on creating new business sectors in our areas of expertise. Today, Kordsa reinforces one of every three automobile tires produced worldwide and two of every three aircraft tires."

Net-zero by 2050

Yıldırım emphasized that they see sustainability as an integral part of their strategy.

"We work together with our suppliers and customers to ensure both social and environmental sustainability in the life cycle from the purchase of raw materials to the delivery of our products to the customer," he said.

"Our company, Axiom Materials, provides advanced composite materials to the commercial aviation industry in the U.S. Our environmentally friendly products, which show flame retardancy and heat resistance, make us unique. The advanced composite materials produced by Axiom Materials are used not only in aircraft engines but also in many new-generation applications in different sectors.

Textile Products and Fabric Development produce lightning fabrics for aircraft. We maintain our business with our responsible stance toward our world and our future. We aim to reach net zero emissions by no later than 2050."

Startup competition

At the JEC 2023 event, the leading startup competition in the world of composites and advanced materials was also held under Startup Booster.

Having been launched in 2017, Startup Booster has been organized in three different regions, namely Europe, the U.S., and Asia, and has already supported over 700 innovative projects from more than 60 countries and produced 80 finalists. Thirty ventures took to the stage. The competition is open to entrepreneurs, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), startups and academic companies building innovative projects in composites and advanced materials.