In Poussan, SEG Dielectrics is surfing the growing e-mobility market

SEG Diélectriques est basée à Poussan, dans la zone des Trouyaux. DR

The only French producer of insulation for electric motors, the Poussan family business SEG Dielectrics has just raised 1.5 million euros and has strong ambitions in a market that opens up new opportunities for it. horizons.

It’s a family and entrepreneurial saga. That of the Mateu. She started and grew up in Montpellier in the post-war period. Trained as chemists, Pierre, the grandfather, and Jean, the great-uncle, had developed a business producing liquid varnishes for alternators and insulating paper. In the eighties, Claude, the father, and Michel, the uncle (*), took over, settling in Poussan to get more comfortable.

Forty-five years later, it’s impossible to miss SEG Dielectrics. With its firecracker red facade and large bay windows, the 6,600 m2 factory sits in the Trouyaux industrial zone and its panoramic vision allows it to see Sète and dominate the plains surroundings.

However, it is towards much more distant horizons that the company is planning. The only French designer and producer of insulating papers for electric motors, SEG Dielectrics, managed since 2010 by Alexandre Mateu, the third generation, is riding the wave of success.

The France Relance plan and a first fundraising

A beneficiary of the France Relance plan, Poussan's company is today boosted by a fundraising of 1.5 million euros from Irdi Impulsion, an investment fund. Occitanie investment specializing in supporting and accelerating the growth of SMEs.

With around fifty employees, with a research and development laboratory of five people, SEG Dielectrics generates 10 M€ of turnover. It exports more than 40% of its production worldwide, particularly to Valeo sites in China, Turkey and Brazil. "Since 2020, the rise in power of electric motors has made us rush into these insulating papers that are placed between the copper and the metal to avoid any short circuits. These are small parts but they are essential", explains Alexandre Mateu.

The Poussan company, which still manufactures varnishes, can boast of seeing its insulators equip all brands of vehicles all over the world. The buoyant electric market is a blessing. "With this acceleration, manufacturers are reorganizing. They are gradually stopping thermal engines and recovering part of the know-how of electric motors. This allows us to become one of their direct contacts, a tier 1 supplier, without going through the equipment manufacturers", explains Renaud Casanova, the sales director.

An ambitious business plan for 2027

The national desire to localize some of the key elements in the production of electric vehicles and to regain sovereignty over strategic components also constitutes an asset for SEG Dielectrics. With the fundraising "which makes it possible to structure and strengthen research and development", the prospect of going from SME to intermediate size (ETI) is emerging. "Our 2027 business plan plans to multiply our turnover by 2.5 with large clients for electric motors but also the batteries. The giga factories that are setting up in the north of France and the rise of batteries made in France are opening up businesses", underlines Renaud Casanova.

Employment could follow: the hiring of 20 to 25 people is planned by 2027. The French pioneer of electrical insulators, which does not rule out a second fundraising more importantly, has probably not finished pressing the accelerator.

Alexandre Mateu is at the head of the family business born in the post-war period in Montpellier. DR

(*) Specializing in graphic arts, Michel Mateu has launched into the adhesive of PVC films for advertising and visual communication. In 1989, he created the company Hexis with the success that we know: based in Frontignan, it grew from 4 employees to 450 employees 35 years later. I subscribe to read more