[LES ECHOS] Olikrom makes bike paths visible without electricity

Created by a CNRS researcher, the start-up has developed materials that change color in certain states. Its photoluminescent paint provides ten hours’ visibility and is used on 500 km of cycle paths.

“Under the sun’s rays, most materials transform the energy they collect into heat, but some emit a light wave. This is the principle of photoluminescence found in nature, which we have adapted to develop our Luminokrom paint”, explains Jean-François Létard, founder of Olikrom. This paint, which makes road markings visible at night, has been developed in partnership with Eiffage since 2015. Pessac, the Gironde town where Olikrom is based, was of course the first to inaugurate a luminescent bicycle path.

Since then, the paint has been used on over 500 km of trails in dozens of local authorities. One example is Sophia Antipolis, the technology park in the Alpes-Maritimes region, which has just completed the marking of a new 2 km bike path in the middle of nowhere. “Our paint offers ten hours’ visibility in the dark at a distance of 80 m. This is something no other product can offer. No other product is capable of this”, argues Jean-François Létard.