Mathieu Flamini has revealed he’s spent the last seven years setting up a company in Italy, GF Biomedical, that is the first in the world to mass produce Levulinic Acid; a substance that can apparently replace oil in all its forms.
The 31-year-old began investing in the business with his pal Pasquale Granata when he left Arsenal for Milan in 2008 and had, until recently, kept the entire venture under wraps, not telling Arsene Wenger, his teammates or his family.
Claiming his side project has been a release from the highs and lows of professional football, Flamini told The Sun he’s proud that it provides employment to over 400 people and that he’s helping to fund ground-breaking research that could help the environment.
“GF stands for Granata-Flamini. At the start we wanted the name of the company to be Green Futures.
“For seven years I haven’t mentioned it to anyone. When I moved to Milan in 2008 I met Pasquale, who became a close friend and we always had in mind to do something together.
“I was always close to nature and concerned about environmental issues, climate change and global warming. He was on the same wavelength. We were looking how we could make a contribution to the problem. After a while we found out about Levulinic Acid.
“It’s a molecule identified by the US Department of Energy as one of the 12 molecules with the potential to replace petrol in all its forms.”
“I invested a lot of money in this,” he continued. “It was a big risk. But to be successful you take risks. It was a challenge.
“We employ around 80 people in the plant and we give work in total to about 400 people. Which at a time of crisis in Italy makes me even prouder.
“There is the plant in Caserta in Italy, we have a lab there, an office in Milan with another in Holland, and we’re planning to open an office in the US soon.”
“We have researchers, chemists and other scientists, from France, Italy, Russia, Holland, Germany and Egypt. And we work closely with the famous University of Pisa — one of the most prestigious universities in Italy.
“We are pioneers. We are opening a new market. And it’s a market potentially worth £20bn. Many people tried and failed to find a way to produce LA on a break-even basis.
“Obviously, when you start something like that and you spend so much money, and where there is risk there is stress.
“To me, it was an escape. A football career is made of ups and downs. It cleared my mind and helped me to think about something different. And it was something intellectually challenging too.”
Flamini also revealed that had the project not taken off he’d have lost a significant chunk of the cash he’s earned playing football. There’s plenty more from him in the original interview here.
It’s all very impressive stuff…Arseblog News particularly like the idea of Flamini sporting a hard hat in the middle of a power plant and just screaming and pointing at people to press buttons. All the while blowing kisses at Mesut Ozil.
We’re not sure though that he’s kept the venture quite as secret as suggested. Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain joked in an Arsenal player video recently that Flamini, “has got a definite hold on nuclear power. I think he does deals daily…gas, eco-friendly stuff…he’s got the world on smash.”
Who knows, with a £20 billion market to take advantage of the Flamster will be very well placed to buy out Stan Kroenke in the coming years. Before that though you suspect Dick Law will be licking his lips at the chance to suggest a pay cut.
I just have this image of him in a white lab coat and safety goggles, test tube in hand cackling wildly in his secret layer that is built into the side of a cliff face on an island somewhere in the Pacific. “We have done it Mesut, we have saved the world”
Is Flames a married man with a family ? or is just on this earth to idolise Mesut and make millions
Good luck fella
Saving the World is a great ( tick) up voted X
He’s a bachelor.
Knowing him and Mesut they’re probably working on it ‘Weird Science’ style…
http://cdn1-www.craveonline.com/assets/uploads/2013/04/weird-science.jpg
WTF is Flames?
I’m pretty sure Flamini the flam, flamster has never been called Flames.
“The Flame” and “Flams” are both old and still-common nicknames. Haven’t heard “Flames”, but why not… it’s not like there are rules for this sort of thing
F Dot Bible?
F Dot Bizzle?
Can’t wait for him to buy Arsenal and get us Messi who’s apparently interested in Arsenal!
While Messi does appear to have expressed an interest in coming to England, with Arsenal reputedly his first choice, he has also expressed an interest in being paid £18,000,000 per year AFTER TAXES. I believe that works out to a pre-tax gross wage of a shade over £600,000 per week, or about £59.52 per minute. That means if he spends the same amount of time in the bathroom each morning that you and I do, he wants to be paid £297.60 for it.
NO-ONE is worth £297.60 to take a shit.
I am impressed by both your analysis of the numbers, and the efficiency of your bowel movements sir. Bravo.
Unless he produces Poo d’Or
I’d have to disagree.
The best footballer of all time is worth that.
I mean, it’s just like doing a transfer of 18m a year.
Except you don’t need to do a transfer, because you guaranteed trophies.
The team where Messi plays, which ever team it is, will be the best team in the world. Not too pricey to pay; and there will be heaps of recoupment on merchandising.
So he did take the ‘Flamoney’ nickname seriously
He must of told Mesut, I refuse to believe he wouldn’t of told him 😉
The world would be a much better place if more footballers invested their money into various research
Apparently John Terry has set up a business printing fake disabled parking badges, useful for footballers in a rush.
He also has a business looking for funding on Seedrs to deploy segregation cages for trains so that he can seperate commuters by race, useful for chelsea fans on tour.
The entrepreneurial spirit at Chelsea doesn’t stop there. Costa and Mourinho are in the process of setting up their own private army. Nothing new there but the main difference being that they’ll openly advertise their guns for hire’s readiness to commit war crimes in order to “get the job done faster and ore cost effective”.
Abramovich is said to be a major investor in the venture.
That and their latest line of fragrance : Cunt sauce-a whiff of special failure.
Chelsea is best known for producing dry gin.
Perhaps but just wait till Cunt Sauce-a Whiff of Special Failure hits the high street.
John Terry is Igor to the life, just look at the square head perfect for balancing cups pof tea on whilst pondering quadratic equations. The sticky out ears which double as pencil sharpeners and the nostrils wonderfully good at opening beer bottles.
Flamini, defensive midfielder, Tottenham’s least favourite striker and clean energy tycoon.
We should keep him around if we ever need one of those internal financial boosts.
Flamini tried to get my girlfriend to have a threesome with him and Alexander Hleb at a bar, no joke. He’s an animal!
Hleb? Endless foreplay with no end product would be my guess…
Lots of dribbling around the box
This is Arsenal. We don’t get taken over by billionaires, we produce them! 😉
Yeaa..you can say that again!!
I love your name mate.been thinking of my next replica Jersey back name i think i have just found it.
Now maybe Flamini can buy out Arsenal from Silent $tan and the Russian Mafia!
Is it just me or did anyone else think that this must be some kind of joke?!
No it wasn’t just you.
Isn’t this a joke?
This seems to be legit. Searched Levulinic Acid & Flamini and, while its mentioned in papers that produce bogus transfer rumors like the Mirror and Daily Mail, one would hope their news departments don’t make up stories like their sport departments do. Disappointed, though, that this Arseblog News article is not linked on GFBiochemicals.com ‘In the Press’ page.
It’s not just you at all. When I first saw this story I thought it was a complete wind-up. But if you look up levulinic acid in Wikipedia, it actually names Flamini’s company as the only one in the world that can mass-produce the stuff.
Wow, who knew? Our iron-hard enforcer and Spud killer is actually a sensitive, green scientist under that rough exterior!
– Invest in the substance that will ultimately replace oil
– Become rich enough to buy Arsenal
– Because oil is now pointless Man City go bankrupt and we win the league
Build this man a statue.
Sounds more like a plot from Southpark
Phase 1
Play Football
Phase 2
?
Phase 3
Take over the world
Please don’t say that. A few of us work in the industry and have been suffering from 2 pay-cuts in the last 6 months.
Pretty soon we will be out on the streets. 🙁
Apply for jobs in the LA industry? I might do this myself as long as being able to actually play football is one of the job requirements.
“isn’t one of the job requirements”
I was always crap at playing football. Darts is what I’m best at. You can’t down a few pints while playing football.
I thought this was one of those joke/fuck around articles. I’m impressed flam!
Mathieu Heisenberg Flamini
I’m not sure about that!
He’s got some balls to invest in such a risky business, spending a lot of what could have already guaranteed him safe retirement. In era of plastic footballers to find a bright example of visionare is an amazing thing. And he is a Gooner, who else could be?
Proud of you, Mathieu. And he kept it as a Secret, this guy is a real deal. I hope he succeedes!
Cool, All Hail The Flamster……
Ok I’ve googled it and it’s in the Sun and Mail so must true.
A replacement for oil?
My goodness, this could end all world wars, end world poverty, save the environment and make Arsenal a bilionario club all in one go. It’s too good to be true. Too good.
Flam and Mesut get into a bit of an argument.
Flam: “I am the one who points! ”
Mesut: 😮
One day Flamini will turn up at the training ground in a flying Delorean. Mesut turns up a few minutes later wearing a puffer vest and the training grounds empty, no balls anywhere. Flamini tells him “Where we’re going, we don’t need balls.”
Then they embark on a time travelling adventure to find a young Robin Van Persie cycling in Rotterdam dreaming of future Tweeps, and cover him and his bicycle in shit.
Then we wouldn’t have that 125th anniversary game-winning volley.
Very interesting. Although weirdly, nothing on their website mentions the environmental impact and energy cost of the production process; nor of further production processes needed to make this stuff into fuel and other oil-based chemicals. They seem to assume that by making green the dominant color of their website we will believe that this stuff is environmentally friendly, but for all the information they provide it might as well be a more environmentally damaging substitute for oil (where the profit is in it being either cheaper to make or less likely to run out).
Rant time
Damn you Flamini. I feel like companies like his are the last straw for oil workers like us.
Sorry everyone but suffering through pay-cuts in the last 6 months, low oil price and now emerging companies like his makes me scared of the future.
I have nothing against Flam tho. Rant over.
While it is completely understandable that losing a job is a most terrible experience, one really cannot let that hinder the progress of eco-friendly alternatives to oil. It’s a recognised fact that by continuing producing oil will eventually make earth unhabitable for humans aswell as a wide range of other species. None of us will ever meet our great great grandchildrens kids, but I’d still want for them to not get born into a world of war and hunger. I’d gladly sacrifice my salery for that.
Lets hope the emerging companies will employ workers from the oil-industry though!
Ups and downs Parth. I know you are hurting now but when oil was king I’m sure you could have bathed in notes or dollar bills. The world is changing and we need risk takers like Flamster to help us evolve for the better! So I guess his adventure in Italy wasn’t a total failure. Really thought he left the Arsenal at the wrong time in his career. Him and Cesc were forming a wonderful partnership but Milan offered him the € that Arsenal were not willing to, so I suppose fair play to him even though it regressed his… Read more »
…and while Flamini was setting up his company, and we were bemoaning his leaving us, Fabregas was busily resisting the irresistible call from his beloved boyhood club Barcelona, telling us he loved our Club and was a Gooner for life, and making annual attempts to get a deal to move to Real Madrid that (sadly for him) never quite reached fruition. Then to cap it all off we (supposedly) then let him follow his dream to return to Barcelona by agreeing a bargain price (which their President then took the piss out of us for). Suddenly I can see why… Read more »
Fuck oil, I’m applying to that GF company.
Should update my resume to the following:
Strength: pointing and screaming
Personal interest: laughing at Tottenham
Finger cross for at least getting an interview, lads!
Anyone know if we can invest in this ?
According to their LinkedIn page (https://www.linkedin.com/company/gfbiochemicals), it’s a privately held company, so you cannot buy shares. However, you could contact them, and see if they’re interested in your money.