Changing the Way Meta-materials Are Designed and Manufactured

One of the promising trends in the industry is the introduction of meta-materials. These are engineered materials that do not exist in nature, with a unique microstructure, which gives them exceptional properties. The meta-materials fulfill a range of intricate and sensitive tasks in industry, especially in highly complex systems. But in recent years a significant challenge has made it difficult to increase the use of meta-materials: expensive, complicated, and slow product design processes.

FVMat was founded to transform the way meta-materials are designed and manufactured. The company is located in Haifa, and it is a part of the IN-VENTech growth program in hiCenter, which promotes over 50 high-tech companies in Haifa by providing full support through the program staff, including assistance in business development, guidance in raising capital, and grants of up to half a million NIS.

FVMat, which started operations at the beginning of 2023, develops simulation software that has advanced technological capabilities to streamline complex research & development processes. "We want to change the way meta-materials systems and components are designed," says Dr. Doron Kleapch, founder and CEO of the company. "At the beginning, we had only a basic idea, we didn't think about a company at all. With the development of our technology and being in contact with customers and users, we reached the conclusion that the market has a significant gap in meta-materials' design and development capabilities."

Klepach explains that today the use of meta-materials requires the investment of enormous resources, even before production begins. "If a company wants to develop a product in the field of meta-materials, it needs to recruit people, accumulate knowledge, and use very powerful computing capabilities, all of which cost a lot of time and money. The process itself is complex: you need to do in-depth research on each case individually. Our tools are designed to change this reality. We want to provide novel and intuitive simulation and optimization tools for developers, engineers, and entrepreneurs, who use meta-materials and to open a new playground with tremendous capabilities. Eventually, they will be able to develop products that we can't even think of today. We don't provide a particular material but tools for developing systems and components. In other words, we don't give customers fish but fishing rods."

Artificial intelligence capabilities
Meta-materials address diverse needs in the industrial world, especially in complex industries such as aerospace and defense. Thanks to the uniquely engineered microstructures of meta-materials, it is possible to endow them with physical and mechanical properties that do not exist in nature.

FVMat's simulation and optimization tools use advanced artificial intelligence capabilities to address the complex needs of meta-material design. "We are breaking the convention that a microstructure is uniform throughout the component. Our tools allow users to embed different types of unit-cells. If you need one region without vibrations and another region with low heat propagation, the system knows how to design such a part as a single component. Moreover, FVMat introduces a new generation of multi-functional meta-materials that have dynamic properties. In other words, they can be controlled proactively and dynamically or adapt to the environment."

Meta-Materials market and trends
Meta-materials are an emerging field that is rapidly growing in optics, electromagnetics and mechanics. Applications such as: shock absorbers, 5G antennas, lenses, high frequency communication devices and many more.

The market of meta-materials is already valued at over a billion dollars and continues to grow at an annual rate of 40%. Therefore, there is a need for engineering tools that will enable design and optimization of these engineered materials. Multi-functional Meta-Materials are providing solutions that cannot be achieved with a standard design process and require out-of-the-box solutions. The early adopters of these technologies are mainly in the aerospace and defense sector that FVMat is targeting in Israel and in the US.

Leaving the users in their comfort zone
After intensive development work, FVMat plans to launch the first version of its meta-material design system within 2024. "We also work on integrating our tools into standard engineering commercial software platforms," clarifies Doron Klepach. "The goal is to keep users within their comfort zone: both working with the standard tools, and also benefiting from the new capabilities that our products provide."

To advance the meta-materials vision, the company works in cooperation with Ansys, an American multinational company, one of the leaders in the field of engineering simulations. As part of this collaboration, the new FVMat software will be integrated into the Ansys system as a plug-in. "It's a very successful collaboration, but it's not exclusive. We also aim at other simulation software in the market, according to customers' needs."

In addition to preparing for the software launch, FVMat also offers meta-material consulting and product development services. "We understand that there are companies, especially in the aerospace field, that don't settle for software tools alone," explains Klepach. "Therefore, we offer full research & development of products to provide an end-to-end solution."

In collaboration with IN-VENTech